Halo: Black Ops
by metal-head111
Summary: AU In 2553, an elite Black Op squadron was created to fight the Covenant behind enemy lines. They left and re-appeared in 2525 in an attempt to stop the war. They failed. This is the story of the Task Force 141. FINISHED!
1. Prologue

**This is my very first fanfiction, so please go easy on me. If the characters seem a little OOC, please tell me, so I can make the story a bit more realistic. I don't own Halo or Call of Duty. The only thing I own is Group 821, Ft. Ticonderoga, Dr. Emmett Brown, and the UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun. Well, I think that's enough chit-chat. Enjoy!**

Halo: Black Ops

Arbiter Thel' Vaddem, Master Chief John-117 and his A.I, Cortana, return to Earth from the Ark. Amidst all the celebration of humanity's victory, they befriend a scientist named Emmett Brown who has the ability to travel back and forward through time with a time machine. Master Chief, Cortana, and the Arbiter use that to their advantage and, along with Dr. Brown, travel back to certain periods of time to gather soldiers. The purpose, to create the ultimate Black Ops squad and stop the war from happening. But when the original plan goes south, John and his Black Ops squad must fight the entirety of the Human-Covenant War-behind enemy lines.

Prologue

December 11th, 2552

Unidentified Forerunner Installation [UNSC/Separatist forces call installation 'The Ark']

_UNSC Forward Unto Dawn_

"gun it chief, floor it! Right into the hanger bay!" Cortana yelled into the Spartan's ears. John gave it everything the Warthog had and jumped it inside the _Dawn_'s hanger bay, causing it to flip and turn. John-117 and the Arbiter crawled out of the damaged Warthog. The Frigate slowly gave way, causing a Scorpion tank to come crashing into the Arbiter. Due to quick reflexes and thinking, the Arbiter dove behind some supply crates, saving his life. After a quick nod, the Arbiter ran to the bridge to pilot the frigate away from the doomed ring. John stayed behind and put Cortana in a nearby holo-tank.

"hang on!" she warned. As the engines roared to life, the frigate pointed upward, causing the SPARTAN to hang onto the holo-tank for dear life. The warthog he drove in fell down and smashed into his shoulder, sending him backwards. John frantically clawed at the floor for something to hold onto. Frustrated, John smashed his fist into the metal floor, preventing him from being flung into deep space.

"Chief!" Cortana said, worried he would fall out. Looking up, John saw, to his horror, a massive Scorpion battle tank fly towards him. Flattening his body as close to the floor as he could, the tank flew past and into open space, barely grazing the soldier. As the Arbiter settled into the bridge to pilot the frigate into the portal, which he did by gunning the engines and making John's descent to the tank even more slow,

"if we don't make it….." Cortana started.

"we'll make it."

"it's been an honor to serve with you, John." Cortana said. The SPARTAN relaxed and leaned his head back against the tank as the replacement Halo ring went off, destroying all life on the Ark. The frigate made into the portal, but it was now a matter of making through to the other side safely.

"come on, come on." the Arbiter muttered to himself. The frigate made it to the portal safely without the portal collapsing in on itself. It came out the other end facing Earth barrel first. The Arbiter pulled back on the controls, pulling the frigate upwards to prevent it from falling straight into the oceans below.

"frigate _Forward Unto Dawn_, this is the _Cairo_, Admiral Hood commanding. Commander Keyes, I need a sitrep, now." Admiral Hood said. John walked over to a comm unit and pressed the button.

"Admiral Hood, this is Sierra-117. The Flood has been destroyed and Truth is dead. I say again, Truth is dead. The war's over, Admiral." John said.

"where's the Commander?" Hood asked.

"dead." the veteran SPARTAN sighed. The frigate fell into a standard orbit around the planet and docked with the _Cairo_. John walked in and saluted the elderly admiral. His appearance, covered in blood from enemies and allies fallen, made everyone take a reflexive step back, except Admiral Hood. After saluting the Admiral,

"good to have you back, Chief. I'm sorry to hear about our loss, but we won a great victory as well. Did you find Cortana's solution, Chief?" Hood asked.  
>"more then that." John replied.<p>

"you got Cortana back?" the Admiral asked, surprised that John was able to pull off such a feat.

"right here, Admiral." John said, pulling out the data chip and handing it too the admiral.

"thank you, Chief." the admiral said, studying the chip.

"she's not rampant, I promise you that." John growled as cold and harsh as he could muster. Which was rather easy, considering all the hell he went through on the Ark. Hood didn't reply. After finishing some paperwork, none of which concerned the SPARTAN, John was free to go.

"you're free to go now, Chief. We still have a small bit of resistance in northern Africa, but I'm sure once the word gets out that Truth is dead, the Covenant are probably gonna surrender. You can either be sent back to Africa to help out the resistance, or we can give you your shore leave right now."

"how long does the shore leave last?" John asked.

"under normal circumstances, and when I mean normal I mean during the war, it would last around one to two weeks. But considering that the war is now over, and I can't exactly imagine the hell you went through to kill Truth, we're prepared to give you an extended shore leave. Three months." Hood said, catching John and Cortana off-guard.

"three months, Admiral?" John and Cortana said, both were surprised.

"three months, Chief. It's your decision, however, so I'm not gonna complain about either one you make."

"with all respect, sir, I'll take the shore leave." John said.

"I was expecting you would say that. Well, we still have one last little bit of business for you. A scientist who works for the Office of Naval Intelligence, Section III, wants to see you. He wouldn't tell me everything, all he said was he wanted to see Cortana and your armor."

"he wanted to see Cortana and my armor, that's all?" John asked, surprised by his newest order. Unlike previous orders, he mostly or fully understood them. This one, however, didn't make any sense at all.

"he didn't say anything else. His name is Dr. Emmett Brown, M.D. and Ph.D., although everyone else just calls him Doc. He prefers to be called Doc, but you can address him how you want. He's currently stationed down in Ft. Ticonderoga in southern Australia, a top secret weapons R&D ONI base. It's mostly for constructing experimental weaponry for the military, but they haven't had so much luck, most of their funds have been diverted to the general military."

"how do you know of all this, sir?" Cortana asked.

"seeing as I am the de facto commander of all the UNSC forces here at Earth, I need to know what we have at our disposal." Hood said, saluting the SPARTAN. John-117 saluted back. After shaking hands, John grabbed Cortana and headed down to the main hanger bay. Hopping in an already designated Pelican, he sat down in the chairs rather heavily, taking his helmet off and sighing.

"Pelican 492, this is Ft. Ticonderoga, please respond?" the base commander asked.

"Ft. Ticonderoga, this is Pelican 492 with Sierra-117 onboard, permission to land, over."

"permission granted, four-nine-two." the voice returned very enthusiastically. The pilot landed the bird in a large hanger bay. John climbed out and looked around. There were plenty of Marines and ODST's all around the base, but no Dr. Brown. John walked up to a Marine Lt. and asked him where he could find Dr. Emmett Brown.

"he's in lab 51. See that door, go through that hallway to the elevator at the far end, take it down to sub-level one, the lab should be on the left, you can't miss it, Master Chief."

"thanks, Lieutenant." the SPARTAN saluted.

"good to have you back, SPARTAN." the soldier said. John headed to the elevator and took it down to sub-level one. While he headed down,

"you alright, John?" Cortana asked.

"Cortana, do you know of a Dr. Emmett Brown?" John asked.

"if he works Section III of the Office of Naval Intelligence, I'm afraid I don't, I don't have all that information."

"didn't you once hack into Ackerson's file and blackmail him?" John asked.

"yes I did. During my time there, I didn't find anything concerning a Dr. Emmett Brown. If he does exist, this'll be our first chance to meet him in person." Cortana said. The elevator stopped at sub-level one. The doors opened with a hiss and the super-soldier stepped out. Scientists and Marines quickly scattered out of the way to let the SPARTAN walk by.

"I hate it when they do that." John muttered.

"can't say I blame them. A seven-foot tall super-soldier covered in human, Covenant, and Flood blood and gore, I'd get outta the way as well." Cortana joked.

"smart-ass." John smiled. He found lab 51. Breathing deep, John walked in and was greeted by a science lab that had a military feel to it. There were BR55 battle rifles and ammunition clips lying about. John then spotted the doctor, talking with two other scientists. After the other two left, John walked up to the smaller man. He was old, but not super old. He had frizzy white hair and wore a lab coat. John thought he looked familiar to the character 'Doc' from the Back to the Future movies he watched with the rest of the SPARTAN's during the earliest beginnings of the war.

"Master Chief Petty Officer Sierra-117, reporting as ordered, Dr. Brown." John saluted.

"at ease, SPARTAN. You don't have to call me Dr. Brown, just call me doc. Everyone does. Make yourself at home, SPARTAN, I feel uneasy with you just standing there." Brown said, sitting down and opening a flask.

"you got a chair that can support a one-ton SPARTAN?" John asked.

"all these chairs can support you, just sit down for Pete's sake." Brown said. John slowly sat down next to the doctor.

"Admiral Hood said you wanted to see me, mostly my armor and Cortana." John said.

"that's the truth. I overheard when you came back, I managed to hack the main comm system. I'm building a new set of armor for SPARTAN's. I have all the technical data with me, I just need a base template. And seeing that you are the only SPARTAN we have, I thought why not contact you. As for Cortana…., when Admiral Hood met with the Separatists over Voi, yes my team hacked the comm there as well, he said something about Cortana being corrupted. So I thought I could help Cortana by bringing her to metastability." Brown said, catching John and Cortana off guard, for the second time.

"you can bring Cortana to metastability?" John asked.

"ONI has been keeping that rather secret for a while, but yes, we can bring her to metastability. It's not easy, but it is doable. Besides, the information she has concerning the Forerunner Halo network would be extremely helpful to the UNSC, and to humanity as a whole, if she weren't rampant." Brown said.

"how do you know of the Halo network, and how'd you know I had knowledge about it?" Cortana asked.

"I have my ways. So, do you want her metastable or not?" Brown asked with a warm smile.

"do what you can." John said, taking the data-chip out of his helmet. Before he gave it to the doctor,

"don't lose her. I can't afford to lose her." John said.

"I promise you I won't." Brown said. Brown got up from the chair and put the chip in a data slot. After typing up some calculations, most of which John didn't understand at all, Brown did his work on Cortana to bring her to metastability. After 20 minutes which seemed like an eternity for John,

"here she is." Brown said. John took the chip and put it back in his helmet. That familiar feel of cold ice going down his spine was extremely re-assuring to the SPARTAN.

"are you alright?" John asked.

"you know that feeling you get when a weight has been lifted off your shoulders? Metaphorically, that is?" Cortana asked.

"you got that feeling?" John asked.

"probably 10 times better then that." Cortana said.

"now I need to take a look at your armor." Brown said.

"yeah, Admiral Hood said something about you inspecting my armor. I need to ask, why?"  
>"I'm in the process of building a new set of armor for SPARTAN's. But I need a working suit to get a look of what I need."<p>

"not that I don't appreciate that, but the war's over. I don't know if there's another need for a new suit of SPARTAN armor at the moment. Even if you do have the resources and abilities to do so, I still don't think the Corps will need them at the moment." John said.

"alright." Brown said.

John took the moment to get up and take a look around the lab; he was rather impressed by what he saw.

"you're a scientist, correct?"  
>"that's right. I'm the last living member of Group 821."<p>

"Group 821, what's that?" John asked.

"sit down, you're gonna have to get comfortable." Brown said.

John sat down and removed his helmet, sticking Cortana in a holo-tank.

"Group 821 is…. Was, a top secret weapons R&D scientific group fielded by the highest branch of the Office of Navel Intelligence. We were so secret that, technically, we never existed, we were all blacked out on paper. Our main objective was to create new and advanced weapons for the military to use. One of our objectives was to create a new suit of armor for the SPARTAN's and ODST's. we never got past the drawing board on most of our plans, but if we had the time, then we could've made most of our dreams into reality. The plan was that ONI give us a Phoenix-class colony ship and we physically expand it to be much more larger. But we found that it would actually be cheaper, and faster, to build a super-carrier from scratch. We liked the design for the Phoenix colony ships, so we built a super-carrier to look like a colony ship, but it's much larger, a helluva lot more durable, and possess a lot more firepower then any ship humanity built. One prototype was built, but we never used it. When Reach fell, all of G-821 resigned their commission in ONI and joined the Marines to stop the Covenant. And look what happened to them. Hell, the ship was fully stocked with weapons, vehicles, food, fuel, and supplies to fight the war. It even had it's own crew. But I'm the only one left." Brown said, drinking from his flask.

"if it had it's own crew, why wasn't it deployed?"

"we had just finished building it when Reach fell. At the time, we felt it wasn't safe to test out the new ship when Earth was being attacked. We didn't know if any of the main systems would work or not in the heat of battle. So we've kept it hidden."

"this super-carrier of yours, it was never destroyed?" John asked, now a little curious to see the ship.

"yup. I modified it 12 weeks ago to serve another purpose: to travel through time. That was the only reason I joined Group 821 when I was younger." Brown said.

"when was the group formed?" Cortana asked.

"2532."

"and what do you mean you augmented the ship to travel through time, you invented a time machine?" John sarcastically asked.

"actually, I have." the doctor said.

"what do you mean, you've invented time travel?" John asked.

"I'll show you." he said, leaving the lab and heading to the hanger deck.

"come on, I'll show you." Brown said. John sighed. He grabbed his helmet and the data-chip, put his helmet back on, threw the data-chip back in his head, and followed the scientist to the hanger deck, where Brown had a Pelican waiting. As the Pelican left Earth's atmosphere,

"you know, has anyone ever told you, you look like Russell Crowe, you're just unusually pasty white?" Brown asked.

"no, because no-one has ever seen me without my helmet." John replied stiffly.

"you do, actually." Cortana said in a playful manner.

They found themselves flying toward a frigate opening a slipstream portal.

"where're you going?" John asked.

"that frigate is going to Jupiter, that's where 821 hid the ship." they piggy-backed along the frigate's portal and found themselves around Jupiter. They entered one of it's gaseous moons and found themselves staring down the barrel of a massive warship. Doc Brown was right, this thing did look like a Phoenix colony ship, but larger then any ship John had ever seen, aside from the Forerunner Dreadnought, High Charity, the Halo rings, and the Ark. As the Pelican flew towards one of the many hanger bays, John caught the name of the ship: _Rise of the Morning Sun_. When they got onboard,

"follow me, I'll give you the whole tour." Brown said.

"I have a question that has to be answered: how the hell did your Group 821 build this thing without anyone finding out? I'm no expert on money and economics, but from what I've seen, this thing looks too expensive not to be noticed by anyone high up in command or ONI." John said.

"Group 821 was very smart about that. We hired many private contractors instead of the Materials Group to build this thing. And when I mean many, I mean it _everyone_ that could make steel or wires was hired to build this ship. By spreading it out, we managed to keep the cost very low so no one would ever find out. ONI thought we'd hire the MG on Mars. So even they don't know this ship exists." Brown said. John saw that Brown was right when it came to a crew: there were hundreds if not thousands of Naval personal and Marines all around the ship. _how did we even get this many personal, we could've used them during the Battle of Earth. Is Dr. Brown hiding something from me?_ John thought to himself.

"I don't really see anything suggesting this thing can travel in time." john said, looking for something to change his mind.

"here it is." Brown said, unlocking a door. Inside the room was a piece of machinery that John didn't recognize. He expected a massive machine that took up the whole room. Instead, he saw a generator-sized object that only took up a small part of the room, although there were dozens of computer screens and consoles surrounding the machine and mounted on the walls. Technicians were furiously typing in lines of code that John guessed were important to the machine.

"that, my friend, is the Portal Flux Capacitor. It's what makes time travel possible. I've spent the greater half of my life and my family's entire inheritance to create this. This is my greatest invention."

"you say this thing can now travel back and forth through time?" John asked.

"oh yes, very easily. I've already done several small tests. This thing is definitely ready for time travel. Check it out. All you have to do is enter the date, and the specific time in the console, and you're ready. For example, you wanna go back to when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, hit December 7th, 1941. Or you could go to when the Berlin Wall fell. Or you can go back to during the great war, like December 16th, 2535." Brown said, punching in the numbers. Then he paused.

"yes, December 16th, 2535. The day I invented time travel." Brown said, happily remembering the incident.

"how'd you come with time travel?" Cortana asked.

"I was in my bathroom taking a leak, and I noticed that one of the lights was flickering like mad. Was driving me insane. So I got up to fix it, and I slipped. Banged my head against the sink countertop. When I came to, the idea for the Portal Flux Capacitor was in my head. So I euthanized my entire family-"

"you killed your entire family?" John and Cortana asked, very shocked.

"hey, I needed all the money. Anyway, I euthanized my entire family, inherited all their money, and got set to work to create the Portal Flux Capacitor." Dr. Brown was very calm about telling his new friends that he killed his entire family just for the money. After getting over the initial shock that Dr. Brown killed his family, John asked him something.

"so, what do you plan on using the time machine for?" John asked.

"what do you mean?" Brown asked.

"what was your plan?" Cortana asked.

"oh. I wanted to go back in time and stop this damned war from ever happening. And despite that this thing has enough rifles, tanks and Warthogs to fight a small battle on it's own and that we have a crew, I still need a command officer. I'm a physicist, not a navy captain. Why do you ask?" Brown asked.

"you mind if I borrow your time machine for a little bit?" John asked.

"why do _you_ask?" Cortana asked.

"I plan on using it to go back in time and change the course of the war."

Oddly enough, Brown and Cortana weren't against John's plan, they were for his idea.

"you got a crew?" Brown asked.  
>"not really. The goal is that I actually go back in certain points of Earth's history, grab some soldiers who I deem to be 'elite', and create a black ops squad and defeat the Covenant behind enemy lines. What do you think?"<br>"it might work. But if it's just a bunch of United States Marines, then you better grab some SPARTAN's and ODST's. But either way, I'm coming with you."

"come again?"  
>"I built the equipment that makes time travel possible. My crew doesn't know how to work it, only I know how to work it. So, if you want to change the course of the war, you'll need me."<p>

"Doc's got a point, Chief, you're gonna need him." Cortana said.

"you got a holochamber I could use for a moment?" John asked.

"right this way." Brown said, leading him to a large holochamber.

"you said you were planning on building a new set of SPARTAN armor." John said.

"that's right. You plan on building some?" Brown asked.

"I need around eight suits."  
>"your crazy, it takes months to build even one suit, what makes you think we can build eight suits like that?"<br>"then we'd better get started then. Do you have the supplies?" John asked.  
>"I got enough to build 50 suits."<p>

"good." John said, pulling up a holographic representation of the MJOLNIR Mark VI armor. He took his helmet off and inserted Cortana so she appeared.

"so, what's your new suit gonna look like?" Cortana and Brown asked simultaneously.

"well, I plan on making it much more lighter, but it's much harder to destroy. The outer shell, I would like to be made with titanium alloy with a diamond-like coating, along with a Kevlar mesh woven into the Nano composite bodysuit."

While he said all this, he was touching the holo-graphic model of the armor and taking pieces off and putting them into a holo-graphic trashcan, and replacing them with other objects.

"the hydrostatic gel stays, the reactive metal liquid crystal layer stays, the holder strips stay, put three layers of energy shielding on the armor, let's see if the shielding can be shaped by the user. The pressure seal is amped up, keep the biofoam injectors, let's make the reactor powered by both fusion and plasma, the FMC's stay, reactive circuits stay, power supply definitely stays, and let's make the lock-down system even better."

The holographic representation of John's new armor looked the same as the one he was currently wearing, although it would be vastly different.

"oh, and let's put a chainsaw on the left arm for melee attacks, and a needle gun on the right arm. Just to add some extra firepower. Let's make 'em interchangeable as well with each other." John smirked. On the left forearm, a small chainsaw appeared where the blades just came out underneath the left hand. On the right forearm, which was covered with needle rounds, was a tubular-shaped object underneath the right forearm.

"let's hook both of those up to the system, shall we?" John muttered to himself as he toyed with the hologram some more.

"anything else you wanna throw on there?" Cortana asked.

"a while back, I did some research on the MJOLNIR armor. Turns out, a SPARTAN team code-named NOBLE used MJOLNIR V armor with special armor enhancements and abilities. I wanna put those on the armor; they're called Active Camouflage, Armor Lock, Drop Shield, Evade but let's tone that one down a lot, Hologram, Jet Pack, and Sprint. Hey Doc, you got any super-strong materials to build this suit that would make it really light, but strong and fast as hell?"  
>"if you're talking about the 'nonexistent' material crystalite, I got it."<br>"oh, and could you make one of the suits for a female SPARTAN with a robotic prosthetic on her right arm?" John asked.

"what, you gonna rescue Noble Team?" Cortana joked.

"uh, just a thought. Oh, and the suit comes with a temperate-control system, if the wearer feels to hot, they just turn on the AC, if they're too cold, they crank up the heater. Oh, and if it's possible, let's make them capable of the wearer using the armor in slipspace, they can enter and leave slipspace at their own will, provided a ship is nearby." he muttered.

"you know an awful lot about MJOLNIR armor." Brown said, a little suspicious.

"is that a problem?" John asked. After a moment of silence,

"alright, we can make one of those suits." Brown said.

Constructing the suits began immediately; however, it was extremely long and arduous work, met with failure and failure, again and again. And the worst part of it was, since it was MJOLNIR armor, John had to be the guinea pig to test out every piece of equipment because he was the only SPARTAN onboard. Even with the crew helping out to build it, only Doc Brown and Cortana were the experts in building MJOLNIR armor, so it took longer then John wanted. But it was worth it, with these new suits, John would be even more unstoppable then he previously was. 6 months after they first started, the eight suits of new MJOLNIR armor were finished. The MJOLNIR Mk. VII (seven) was finally finished. Now it was Brown's turn for the torture.

November 8th, 2553

"hey Doc, I just came up with an idea to create a new set of armor for non-augmented humans."  
>"how many copies do you want?"<br>"well, I'll be doing it for the whole crew, and then some."  
>"you want to make 20,000 plus suits of armor?" the doctor exclaimed.<p>

"c'mon, it can't be that bad, creating 20,000 plus suits of armor for non-augmented humans, it'll be easy." John replied with a smile.  
>"knowing you, you'll turn 'em into MJOLNIR copycats." Brown said with a frown. Which was just what john was looking into. Basically, the new armor he wanted was an ODST ballistic armor jacked up on steroids, complete with energy shielding, hardened ballistics gel and outer titanium alloy armor, and an enhanced HUD-system, along with waterproof and vacuum-proof seals. It also came with a respiratory system allowing the wearer to wear the suit during EVA activity. The downside was, it only came with 35 minutes of breathable air, while the new MJOLNIR armor came with 15 hours of breathable air. It also came with a jetpack, but they couldn't put any of the other enhancements on because the ODST's weren't augmented and the ODST armor itself lacked the necessary power required for the abilities. John wanted half to be UNSC Marine armor, but the extremely complicated armor enhancements John demanded couldn't be used on Marine armor. There were several setbacks, however, the most major one was the cost issue. They had to order in <em>everything<em>from hundreds of private contractors. The shielding was a large problem as well. John wanted to reverse engineer the MJOLNIR shielding, but that was near impossible, the ODST suit couldn't hold that much power. So they simply slapped on dozens of Jackal wrist shield bands and augmented the power sources, so one continuous bubble shield would wrap around user. Once the new armor was finished,

"so, are we gonna do some time traveling, or what?" Brown asked.  
>"sure. Uh, how does it all work?" John asked.<p>

"you just type in what date you want to visit, and where you want to visit."  
>"just one more thing, is it possible to grab someone from the past but leave a copy of themselves behind so history doesn't get all messed up?"<p>

"I got some Forerunner technology that'll do just that. It grabs whoever you want to pull, and creates a total copy of them."

"a clone?"  
>"honestly, I don't understand a whole lot of Forerunner language, but I'm smart enough to know that they were interested in time travel. They built a lot of crazy shit to achieve their goals, but never accomplished them because of the Flood."<br>"and how do you know of the Flood?"  
>"I've been traveling across the entire galaxy, hunting down Forerunner artifacts to learn about their history. I know a lot of stuff."<br>"let's get back to my original question, is it possible to grab some-"  
>"grab someone from the past and not fuck up the timeline, yes, it's possible. I can't explain it, you wouldn't understand it, but trust me, Chief, it's possible."<p>

"one thing. If you're sure you wanna come with me, I need to know how good you are in combat." John said. They headed to the rifle range where Brown grabbed a gun off the rack.

"the MP5K submachine gun, I love this weapon." he said. He clicked the safety off and fired off the entire clip.

"15 rounds within the x-ring. Not bad. How good are you in combat, hand to hand?" John asked.

"I once disarmed an ODST. He had his M7 suppressed, all I had were my fists. Here's the video." Brown said. After seeing the video,

"alright then. First, let's go to Sengheilios, I wanna pick up an old friend of mine." John said.

December 31st, 2553

At Sengheilios, at the Vaddem Mansion, which was the largest building on the entire surface of the alien planet, a lone Elite was sitting at a large desk. The Arbiter, Thel' Vaddem. He wasn't really doing anything, but he wanted to be left alone. Until a security soldier walked in.

"what it is, I thought I said I wanted to be left alone."

"sir, someone here wishes to see you."  
>"who?" Thel groaned.<p>

"uh, he calls himself the Demon, sir."

The Arbiter's eyes popped open.

"send him in."

John walked in, wearing his old suit of Mark 6 MJOLNIR armor.

"howdy, Arby."

"since when did you start calling me, Arby?" the elite asked.

"never mind that. I got a proposition for you."

"does this have to do with when I saw a suit similar to the one your wearing flying around during the memorial service?"  
>"Dr. Brown, they found out about when I was testing the jetpacks!" John yelled, looking back at the open door. A voice came from outside the chamber<p>

"dammit, John, I told you not to fly around like that!"  
>"yeah, yeah, I learned my lesson. No, it doesn't have anything to do with that. How would you like to go back in time and prevent the Sangheili from joining the Covenant?"<p>

The Arbiter just laughed; that wasn't possible.

"yeah, laugh it up, but it's possible."  
>"alright, if you can prove to me that you have the ability to travel through time, I might go along with you."<p>

John only smiled.

"Dr. Brown, let's give your time machine a test run!"

The three men-er, two humans and one alien-got inside a Pelican and took off toward the Morning Sun. The Arbiter was very conscience of the looks the crew was giving him once they were onboard. _it's been months since the end of the war. Do the humans still hate my people, hate me for all we've done to them? If the humans suddenly popped out of nowhere and waged genocidal war against my kind, I would have the same feelings as they do._ the Arbiter thought as he walked down the hallways. As if Dr. Brown could read his thoughts,

"don't worry. I gave explicit orders that no one harms you, Arbiter. You still might wanna watch your step, though." Doc Brown said. That wasn't very re-assuring at all. When they got to the bridge

"okay, John, how far back do you want to go, and where do you want to go, more exactly?" Brown asked.

"I'll tell you. The date, April 18th, 1945. Place, Germany. Somewhere in the fields of Seelow Heights."  
>"alright, 1945, Germany, Seelow Heights. You might wanna sit down, time travel tends to give a person extremely massive headaches." Brown said, typing in the date and co-ordinates.<p>

"alright. Portal Flux Capacitor?" Brown asked.

"on." a crewman reported.

"status on starship systems?"

"Magnetic Accelerator Cannon system off line. Archer missile pods are cold, .50mm cannons deactivated for the moment. Sublight engines at full power. Gravitational readings are off the scale off the bow of the ship, Dr. Brown. Getting a reading….. We are in the clear, the portal is ready for us to go through!" the science officer exclaimed excitedly.

"all hands, this is the acting-captain. Be prepared for heavy turbulence, lock down and secure all essential military hardware. All hatches are to be sealed immediately. There is to be no EVA activity, so if you're working outside, get your butt inside immediately." Dr. Brown ordered over the ship's PA system.

"we're ready to travel back in time, on your order, Doctor Brown." the tactical officer said.

"here we go." the doctor muttered. The ship slowly soared into the gravitational field that lay ahead of the; the experience could only be described as having your body being torn apart and roughly thrown back together again, at the molecular level. When it was all over,

"alright, check our readings; take your time and get it right." Brown said calmly. He didn't seem affected by their recent turn of events at all. John-117 and the Arbiter felt like they were gonna throw up.

"getting a reading." the science officer said. After a moment of thick tension,

"Doctor Brown… we are in geosynchronous orbit around Earth at the pre-registered date." the officer said. The bridge erupted in clapping and cheering.

"we have made history, gentleman. Today, we have successfully traveled back in time." Brown said very proudly.

"where are we?" John asked, his voice all slurred. He had been out cold during the past several minutes.

"right where you asked. Earth, April 18th, 1945. The end of World War II."

**Like? Don't Like? Please read and review! Anything constructive is welcomed, no flames please!**


	2. Chapter 1

**I don't own anything. The only thing I own is the UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun, Group 821, Dr. Emmett Brown, the Wunderwaffe Cannons, and the DG-weapons four through ten. The DG weapons one through four belong to Treyarch. Halo belongs to Bungie and Microsoft. Enjoy!**

* * *

><p>Chapter 1<p>

"I thought World War II ended around September 2nd, 1945." Cortana said.

"we're near the end of World War II, but I don't see the difference myself." Brown said.

"that doesn't matter, I got three soldiers I wanna pick up." John said, his voice now becoming more stronger."  
>"how are you gonna do that?" the Arbiter asked, half asleep.<p>

"Dr. Brown says he has some stuff that can allow me to grab people from the past, without messing up the timeline."

The arbiter's eyes immediately popped open. He ran to the a glass window and was shocked. He expected to see UNSC vessels orbiting Earth. All he saw, was Earth itself.

"if you don't believe we traveled back, listen to this, I managed to tap into a communications array, it's extremely primitive, but I got it easily." Cortana said. On the radio, comm chatter erupted into what appeared to be an American Artillery squad receiving orders to bomb some German fortification. The Arbiter was shocked; they really had traveled through time. While he was still digesting that, John, Brown, and Cortana were busy discussing another issue.

"so, who are we gonna get, Chief?" Cortana asked.  
>"three Russians in the 3rd Shock Army, Sgt. Viktor Reznov, Pvt. Dimitri Petrenko, and Pvt. Chernov. Let me ask you something, do you have some technology that can implant history into someone's mind?"<br>"yes. Why?"  
>"why do you ask?" John asked sarcastically.<p>

"let me guess, you're gonna give whoever we're gonna grab the entire history of humanity from World War II to the Human-Covenant war?" Cortana asked.

"yes, that's exactly what I'm gonna do." John said, grabbing his Assault Rifle.

"what's with the rifle, SPARTAN?" a Marine asked.

"incase the Nazi's decide to shoot me. I'm hoping they don't. Do we have a pilot for our craft? Actually, what are we taking down?" John asked.

"I can fly a Pelican myself, to be honest with you. And for your second question, the object in question is a Pelican I modified to pull off this sort of stunt. All I ask is that you don't touch anything. But yes, you can bring extra weapons if you feel the need." Brown.

They climbed inside a modified Pelican and took off toward the surface, being extremely careful not to catch the attention of any of the warring powers.

"so, what's so special about this certain transport?" the Arbiter asked.

"I can pull people out of the timeline and leave a complete copy of them behind. I can't exactly explain it, it works better if you watch it in action. So, where's Reznov, Chernov, and Petrenko?"

"over there, down in that house. Keep the cloak on, Doc." none of the German and Russian soldiers noticed a shimmering in the sky. Down on the ground,

"Dimitri? Finish those bastards! Ha ha! Once again, you cheat death! Our tanks are ready to smash this line, and...CHERNOV! I am not hearing gunshots!" Sgt. Viktor Reznov yelled.

"There is no point, Sergeant. They are already bleeding to death." Pvt. Chernov defended. Reznov handed the downed Russian soldier a bolt-action rifle.

"then maybe our friend, will help them bleed faster." the downed Russian was Pvt. Dimitri Petrenko. As Reznov and Chernov left the destroyed house,

"why do I get the feeling that we're being watched?" Dimitri muttered to himself as he loaded his rifle. Ironically, he was very right.

"okay, I got those three soldiers, bringing them up, right, now." Brown muttered, pressing some buttons on the dashboard. The three soldiers on the ground had a bluish aura surrounding them; no one noticed it, however. Only those on the Pelican could see the glow, it was invisible if you were outside the Pelican. On the Pelican in the main cargo bay, Chernov, Dimitri, and Reznov then appeared. They quickly aimed their guns around, wondering where they were.

"Sergeant, where are we?" Chernov asked.

"did the Germans capture up?" Dimitri asked.

"no, we did." John said, walking up to them. Seeing as they didn't know where they were, and a 7-foot tall, green armored behemoth was standing over them, they decided to shoot him. Needless to say, they were shocked when the bullets bounced off his energy shielding. Faster then they could ever conceive, John moved and knocked the three Russians out cold.

"alright then, give 'em something to keep 'em under until I gather everyone I want." John said. After the drugs were administered,

"so, these three men, they're still down there?" the Arbiter asked, seeing the three copies running into the forest, firing their guns.

"yup, those are copies, complete copies. Physical, mental, emotional, all their skill sets and memories are in those bodies. Them Forerunners were very smart." Brown muttered.

"so, who are we gonna get now?"

"okay, date, May 29th, 1945. Location, Shuri Castle, Okinawa."  
>"I didn't ask for the date, I asked who're going after?"<br>"Sgt. Roebuck, Pvt. Charlie Miller, and Pvt. Polonsky."  
>"I got 'em. Just so you know, why are you choosing these guys? What I mean to say is, why choose only three select individuals instead of a whole squad of soldiers?" Brown asked.<br>"look up their service records, then you'll know why." John said. They headed back to the Morning Sun where they carried the bodies to sickbay and had them drugged to keep them asleep.

"Bridge. Date is May 29th, 1945. We're going to Shuri Castle, Okinawa." Brown said through a comm. The officers up in the bridge typed in the date and location and they traveled through time again to reach their destination. As they rode the modified Pelican to the ground,

"how long are we gonna keep doing this?" the Arbiter asked.

"until I get the men and women I need for my squad." John said, very determined. Down on the ground,

"Everything that was asked of us, we've done. Every night we lay in a filthy foxhole praying the enemy won't slit our throats. Every day we spent crawling through the mud and dirt while bullets whistled all around. But this is the last time we're going to have to put our lives on the line. This is the enemy's last stand. When we take Shuri Castle, we go home. All of us." Sgt. Roebuck was saying to his men. Polonsky and Miller were among them. They never knew of the bluish glow surrounding their bodies; they never knew that exact copies of themselves were left behind to make sure history would be the same. In the Pelican, the three Americans looked around.

"where the fuck are we?" Polonsky asked. He never got his answer as John quickly knocked all three of them out.

"Demon, the humans you grab, do you really have to knock them out?" the Arbiter asked.

"it's the best thing I got so far, until we can figure out something else to knock people out without using violence." John muttered, injecting something into Miller's neck.

"so, who else are we picking up?" Cortana asked.

John had already picked his next soldiers.

"okay, the date, September 19th, 1945. Location, Breslau, Germany. Four soldiers: Edward Richtofen, Tank Dempsey, Nikolai Belinsky, and Takeo Masaki."  
>"okay, three of those names aren't German. One is American, one is Russian, and one is Japanese. Are you correct on the names?"<br>"positive."

"alright." Dr. Brown muttered. They pulled the same routine; dump the bodies on the ship, travel forward through time just a bit, and took the 'body-snatcher Pelican', as John called it, down to their destination.

"where exactly did you say they were?" Cortana asked.

"near Breslau, Germany. They're actually in a weapons factory called Der Riese. You might wanna look at their files; you might like what you see." they cloaked the Pelican and quickly found the factory. It wasn't that hard to do, considering how large it was. The fact that it was still alive puzzled every one except the Arbiter; a Nazi factory that large during WWII would've certainly been destroyed by the American's constant bombing of Germany. That didn't matter, at the moment. What did matter was getting the soldiers John wanted. They quickly found them.

"EAT IT, FREAKSACK!" Dempsey yelled, chucking a grenade into the horde of Nazi soldiers.

"GOOD, ZHEY'RE DEAD, LET'S KEEP MOVING!" Richtofen yelled.

"WAIT, WE CAN'T LEAVE! I FORGOT MY WODKA! I CAN'T FIGHT WITHOUT IT!" Nikolai screamed above everyone else.

"FORGET IT, NIKOLAI!" Takeo retorted. The same bluish glow surrounded them as it did the other soldiers. They appeared in the Pelican. They were still firing their guns when they were pulled out, so bullets then ricocheted around the aircraft.

"where the fuck are we?" Dempsey yelled.

"you're gonna be in hell, if you don't stop shooting." John growled. He got up and into the light. They didn't know who John was, they thought he was some secret Nazi weapon. So they decided to use John against the Germans. Or, they tried to.

"hey buddy, you wanna help us out with the freak sacks down there?" Dempsey asked. His reply was a rifle butt to the head. All of them got the same treatment.

"alright, anyone else from World War II?" Cortana asked.

"nope. We're going to the Cold War now. Date, February 11th, 1968. Location, Laos-Vietnam border. Keep in mind, it's at 1300 hours."

"during the night. Alright, let's get this over with." Brown sighed, piloting the cloaked Pelican back to the _Rise of the Morning Sun_ where he kept the four soldiers unconscious. After typing in the coordinates, they ended up around Earth, nearly crashing into Sputnik.

"okay John, from this moment on, we're gonna have to keep the cloaking device on; we can't risk revealing ourselves to Earth's past."

"I understand." John said, although he really didn't.

"no, you don't understand."  
>"you're right, I don't understand, but I don't want an explanation at the moment."<br>"actually, I can't explain it to you at all, you won't understand. You know, you being trained to kill from the age of 6 and all."  
>"right. Okay, let's get my men."<p>

Once again, they got into the cloaked Pelican and started looking for John's soldiers.

"who are they, again?" the Arbiter asked.

"Cpt. Alex Mason, Sgt. Frank Woods, and CPO. Joseph Bowman. It should be easy to find them, _Sympathy for the Devil _by the _Rolling Stones_ will be blasting out of a radio, that should help us track them. They'll be down in Vietnam somewhere."

"how do you acquire all this information, SPARTAN?" the Arbiter asked.

"if you want something bad enough, you'll go to any lengths to get it done."

John was right; they quickly found the gunboat the three soldiers were on.

"HOW MANY OF THESE FUCKING ZPU'S ARE THERE?" Woods screamed. Mason just blew them away.

"THEY AIN'T GOT SHIT! OOH RAH!" Bowman yelled as a ZPU went up in flames. Same bluish glow, the three soldiers were taken away and copies were left behind. Once again, they were knocked out on the Pelican by John-117.

"who's next?"  
>"alright, date, Feb 9th, 1968. Location, Kowloon City, Hong Kong. We're gonna grab a special agent Jason Hudson and special agent Grigori Weaver."<br>"that's in the past. By a matter of only 3 days." Cortana said, reviewing the information.

"should be easy, we won't waste a bunch of fuel." John smirked.

"to be honest with you, Master Chief, we're not using that much, if any fuel at all to time travel." Brown said.

"explain the whole process to me later, if you can." John said, a little confused. They went through the whole process of returning to the _Morning Sun_, putting the soldiers cold out, going back through time, using the Pelican to grab the two soldiers, same shit. They grabbed Hudson and Weaver, knocked 'em out, and returned to the _Morning Sun_.

"okay, now we're going to the Pentagon. Date, October 1962. During the Cuban Missile Crisis."  
>"and who are we going after?" Brown slowly asked.<p>

"Pres. Kennedy, Prime Minister Castro, Vice Pres. Nixon, and Defense Secretary McNamara." Dr. Brown and Cortana just stared at him. Four of the most powerful men on Earth at that time, he was gonna steal them. The Arbiter didn't know who they were, but judging how Brown and Cortana were staring at John like he was crazy, he guessed it was very bad to take these men.

"and why are you going after those four?" Brown asked.

"Kennedy served in the United States Navy during World War II, so he has some military training. Castro was a military-style dictator, so I'm guessing he had to have some knowledge of a military. If you are the defense secretary of the United States, I'm betting you'd have to have an extensive knowledge of military tactics and combat. I don't know about Nixon, but the fact that he survived that night with those other three says something about him. Just look at this CIA file concerning the four. Especially what happened on that night. It's the reason why I'm interested in those four."

Apparently, on that fateful night, a gas explosion occurred in the lower floors of the Pentagon and strange things began happening. The CIA covered up that the four leaders fought American zombies by saying that assassins managed to breach the Pentagon, but the four managed to fight their way out. Castro quickly left America after that, saying that that was an attempt on his life by Pres. Kennedy. In actuality, Castro left on Kennedy's advice. He suggested that the Soviets would do something like that to Cuba in the near time future, and that he should prepare. That was the reason why Castro was living in paranoia for the rest of his life, except his elderly years when the Soviet Union collapsed.

"um, I guess taking these humans is rather bad, considering how you two are staring at the Demon." the Arbiter slowly said. John grabbed the Elite, planted him down at a computer console, and began to show him the entire history of humanity since the earliest written word to the Human-Covenant War.

"enjoy yourself." John said sarcastically.

"alright, I guess we can take 'em." the Brown said. They got the four men, knocked 'em out, and returned to the Autumn. Now they were moving to the big guns: the 21st Century.

"seeing as we can't persuade you from stealing more people from the timeline to create your black ops squad, who're we picking up?" Cortana asked.  
>"Lt. Gen. Hershel von Shepherd III, Sgt. David Foley, Pvt. James Ramirez, and Cpl. Tyler Dunn. Location, Afghanistan. Date, March 8th, 2016. It'll be rather easy to find them, they're in a spot called The Red Zone. Should be easy to find."<p>

Once again, the Master Chief was right. They got the soldiers, and headed back to the Autumn.

"Location, some Gulag 40 miles east of Petropavlovsk, Russia. Men, Cpt. John MacTavish, Lt. Simon Riley, Sgt. Gary Sanderson, and John Price. Price'll be deep inside the Gulag."

Getting these men was going to be a little bit trickery then the previous soldiers; the time they appeared was when the TF-141 began their assault on the Gulag. So they had to wait it out until the four men John requested were in a room together. After grabbing them,

"Location, Zakhaev International Airport. Men, Vladimir Makarov, Viktor, Anatoly, Lev and Kiril. Don't get Joseph Allen, he's of no use to me."  
>"those men are terrorists, why would you want them?" Cortana asked.<br>"they're good with explosives, I could use them."  
>"alright, I'll get 'em. I still think you're making a mistake." Brown muttered. They still thought John made a mistake grabbing terrorists. Same shit, different day. They got the terrorists and headed back to the <em>Sun<em>.

"so, who're going after now?" the Arbiter asked, who was still looking at Humanity's history. He was rather impressed by all the cultures that were packed onto one planet. He was also shocked and a little scared about how violent Earth was; he now had a good guess as to why the humans fought with such bravery during the Great War. It was almost as if the humans were purely designed to fight for totally victory, nothing else. That was his opinion, however.

"oh, I forgot, I need a Russian pilot, goes by the name of 'Nikolai'. Here's his physical profile so we know who to grab."  
>"I got him, he's not that far; he's actually within range."<br>"get him."

In the bay, a lone Russian soldier in a flight uniform appeared. Again, he was knocked out.

"you gonna get anyone else from the 21st century?" the Arbiter asked.

"nope. Next targets, Noble Team."

Once again, he was met with multiple stares. John was planning to kidnap SPARTAN's. That was near impossible; getting them unconscious that is.

"hey Doc, you got any special chemical that can knock a group of people out so I don't have to do it?"

"now that you ask me, I think do have something. It's back on the _Morning Sun_, it's called Alpha-8X-B, it's something I created personally. It might be what you're looking for." Brown said.

"good, let's get it." John said, very determined to get Noble Team. As they prepared the ship for another journey,

"John, I need to ask you, why are you gonna get SPARTAN's, you gonna engage the entire Covenant military head-on?" Brown asked.

"I'll explain the entire mission later, when I get the rest of my men."  
>"and one more thing, what makes you think you can classify all these people we're grabbing as 'your' men?"<p>

"because I'm the son of a bitch who thought of this whole idea." John muttered. Brown just sighed.

"okay, date?"

"July 24, 2552. Location, Visagrad, Reach. They should be outside the Relay, after they inform Col. Holland. Don't get the girl, just the SPARTAN's." John said. Maneuvering the Pelican into position, and activating a force field that would separate the cockpit and the cargo bay, they locked onto Noble Team and pulled them up. Once they were inside, the gas instantly began dissipating through the system, knocking Noble Team out. It was such a good thing John used the gas Brown created, because they all had their helmets on. The gas was able to penetrate even the most advanced air purification systems. Within seconds, all the SPARTAN's were out.

"so, who're we gonna get next?" Cortana asked, seemingly tired.

"Cpt. Dare's Helljumper squad. I think we all know where they are."

In everyone's minds, this one was by far the most dangerous, seeing as there were UNSC and Covenant starships trying to shoot each other out of the sky. Hell, the Pelican nearly got it's left wing shot off, and the cloak was on.

"Cortana, you're gonna have to do the calculations to get the squad, I'm gonna have to hold the Pelican still. Damn these Banshee's, they're all over me! How the hell can they see us, the damn cloak is on!" Brown yelled.

"you want me to shoot?" John asked, readying a rocket launcher.  
>"no, we can't reveal our position! Cortana?"<br>"I got them, Dr." the female A.I replied. In the bay, several ODST's appeared. Seeing as the gas hadn't cleared out yet, they all fell asleep. With the SPARTAN's. Good thing the gas was very effective, or who knows what would've happened.

"anyone else?" the Arbiter asked.

"it won't matter, grabbing those men and women drained the system; we can't grab anyone else." Cortana said.

"right, I'll get us back to the _Morning Sun_." Brown muttered. When the Pelican docked inside _Rise of the Morning Sun_,

"hey Dr. Brown, I need to ask you guy a massive favor. When I mean big, I mean, something bad might happen to the time line. But I have to do it."  
>"who're you gonna get?"<p>

"Sgt. Avery Johnson and Cmdr. Miranda Keyes." John said, not noticing the Arbiter's eyes slightly light up when John mentioned Miranda. Brown noticed it, but didn't press the issue.

"how you gonna get 'em?" Cortana asked.

"this is theoretical, but say I go in the past, and do something to prevent those two from dying. Would they suddenly appear with us?"  
>"doubt it, they probably would've made their own choices not to come with us. If you want those two, we're gonna have to fix the Pelican. This is just me asking, however, why do you need those two?"<br>"Sgt. Johnson is very good in a fight, we're gonna need him. And since we won't be able to get a Naval captain, I figured we could get Cmdr. Keyes to be our captain." John said.

"here's a question. Why not get Captain Jacob Keyes instead?" Brown said.

"if everything goes according to plan, we won't have to grab him." John said in a manner that suggested this was the end of the conversation. Several officers in the hanger bay had taken notice of their little spat.

"alright, let's fix the Pelican. Maybe we should do this back in our year."

"right. 2553 it is." Brown muttered. The time machine disappeared in a flash of light and ended up in gas moon where they began.

"alright. Cortana, see if you can't fix up the Pelican. John, I want you to research everything about Dr. Richtofen. I'm gonna fix up our new friends here." Brown ordered. Everyone got to work, but it took a while. John found a lot of stuff about Richtofen, but he wanted to know why Brown was suddenly interested in the Nazi. Fixing the Pelican was rather easy, and it was fast.

"hey John, Cortana, I need you in sickbay." Brown asked. The sickbay was rather large. What John saw rather scared him. All the soldiers he grabbed were strapped down on the beds with a device of some sort hovering over their heads. Except the SPARTAN's and ODST's.

"what are you doing?"

"I'm implanting everyone with all the history of humanity from World War II to the beginning of the Human-Covenant War."  
>"is this…. legal?" the Arbiter asked.<p>

"not exactly, but no-one knows of it. So yeah, you could say it's legal." Brown smiled.

"well, the Pelican's fixed, should we get Johnson and Miranda?" Cortana asked.

"sure, let's get it over with." John said. They prepped the Pelican, went back in time a few months, went to the Ark, got Johnson and Miranda, and headed back to their original timeline.

"hey Brown, let me ask you something. Why are you interested in Richtofen?"  
>"not him, par say, but the stuff that he built. You know, the DG weapons and the teleporters."<br>"you're thinking of putting that stuff around the _Rising Sun_?"

"it would make moving around the ship a lot faster then walking, and the weapons he built are pretty bad-ass."  
>"yeah, I guess that's true."<p>

After several moments of boredom,

"hey Doc, when are we gonna get this show on the road, I can't stand the boredom anymore!" John yelled.

"in a moment, our soldier's are gonna wake up soon."

"are you sure about this, Dr. Brown, that everything concerning humanity from the end of World War II to The Great War is in their minds?" Thel asked.

"everything. And it won't have any effect on their minds and memories."  
>"what about the SPARTAN's and ODST's?" John asked.<br>"I put fake memories in them, saying that they survived the war and decided to help us on our mission."

"will that work?" Cortana asked.

"okay, before I did anything to these men and women, I looked the files on Sgt. Johnson, Cmdr. Keyes, Dare's ODST squad, and Noble Team. After getting a feel for who they are, I put fake memories in them regarding what their best actions would be during the war and during the Battle of The Ark."  
>"so…..they won't try and kill me when they wake up?" the Arbiter asked, a little nervous about the SPARTAN's.<p>

"I don't think so, no."  
>"that doesn't really sound reassuring." Thel replied. Pretty soon, everyone started waking up. Well, the SPARTAN's and ODST's woke up first. Everyone else was still sedated.<p>

"hey Chief. That was pretty bad shit at the Ark, huh?" Carter asked. The Arbiter was rather shocked, the Doc was right.

"you're telling me. I'm just glad I had a bunch of SPARTAN's with me, made it a whole lot easier."

"hey Chief, you sure all this will work, you know, grabbing soldiers from the past and using them to fight the Covies behind enemy lines?" Dutch asked, scratching his head.

"I'm pretty sure it'll work, Dutch." John said.

"sure, like the time Dutch thought over-charging his SPARTAN laser to destroy a Phantom would work." Kat said sarcastically.

"so I overcharged to a great degree, at least it didn't kill anyone." Dutch defended.

"you put several Marines in the sickbay because of that little stunt, I seriously doubt you'd consider that not killing anyone." Johnson said.

"well, did it kill anyone?" Dutch asked.

"no." Johnson sighed angrily.

"hey, how long is Doc Brown gonna take to get these soldier up and ready for combat?" Buck asked.

"he said around 5 hours, last I heard." Mickey said, scratching his head.

So they spent those 5 hours trading war stories, trying to see who was the better soldier. The time went rather fast. When the 5 hours was up,

"hey guys, everyone else is waking up now. Chief, you wanna tell 'em why they're here?" Brown asked.

"I guess, I mean, I was the one that started this whole damn idea." John muttered to himself. He went into the sickbay where the men he grabbed were waking up. All had the same look on their faces: where the hell am I, and who are these guys I'm waking up with? And who's the really big green guy in the door? All their questions would soon be answered, however.

"hey Doc, aren't they supposed to recognize that at least I'm a SPARTAN?" John yelled.

"uh, wait a few minutes, the memory system will kick in, just about now."

Suddenly, the soldiers started having spasms of some sort.

"Doc, is that normal?"  
>"that's just their brains reorganizing itself to make room for the new information. It should stop now."<p>

And he was right, the spasms stopped.

"I assume you guys know who I am."  
>"yeah, you're a SPARTAN. I never really seen one up close, though." Dunn said.<p>

"what do you guys know about the Covenant?"  
>"that collection of murderous alien races that destroyed Harvest when we first encountered them?" Shepherd replied.<p>

"yeah, those guys. You're probably all wondering what you're all doing here, I'll explain as best as I can."  
>"please do." Reznov said. John took a deep breath. He could explain a lot of tactical situations very well, but how to explain what he was planning to a group of soldiers he kidnapped from WWII, the Vietnam War, and WWIII was going to be near impossible. He suddenly realized how Dr. Halsey must've felt when she tried to explain to him and the rest of the candidates what they were gonna do in the SPARTAN program.<p>

"alright. I selected all of you because you are among the best of the best. Out of literally, millions of soldiers throughout Earth's history, I felt all of you were the best candidates for this new mission. Our mission, simply put, is that we go back in time to when the Covenant and Humanity first encountered each other at Harvest, and do what we can to stop the war from happening."

"are we really that good?" Dempsey asked.

"that's a good question, Captain Dempsey. My answer is yes. General Shepherd, you wanted to be a war hero to America, right? Why not think bigger, why not show all of Earth what a general you are and become one of the greatest heroes of the war during the Covenant? Dr. Richtofen, you love to fight, you wanna see the blood of your enemies spill, that's why you joined the Nazis. Why not think bigger then that, why not avenge the spilt blood of fallen Germans and take your revenge on the Covenant, spill their blood? And Dempsey, you joined because you wanted to return home with fantastic war stories and win over all the girls you could get. Instead of telling how you stormed the beaches of Iowa Jima, why not tell of how you fought alongside with the SPARTAN's during the war?" John knew stoking their ego's was very dangerous, but he couldn't think of anything else. Stoking their ego's seemed the right move to help motivate them to fight the Covenant. It seemed to work, however.

"so, are when are we gonna fight the Covenant?" Ghost asked. John only smiled. He made a good choice choosing this crop of soldiers.

"soon, Lt. soon." John smiled. Everyone reached for their guns.

"hey SPARTAN, where'd you put our guns?" Roebuck asked.

"in the armory. And….. call me John."

John led them down to the armory, which was a medium sized room. Nikolai Belinsky wasn't impressed.

"I had more guns then this back on the pig-farm!" he yelled loudly as he grabbed a PPSH-41 submachine gun.

"really?"  
>"yeah, I would've figured you would've put a lot more guns on this ship!"<br>how Nikolai knew they were on a starship confused John.

"and how do you know we're on a starship?"  
>"you never said we were inside a bunker."<br>John and the drunk Russian stared at each other.

"you'll do pretty good against the Covenant, Nikolai."  
>"eh, whatever, I just want my wodka." he muttered.<p>

After everyone got their weapons,

"so when are we gonna fight against the Covenant?" Gen. Shepherd asked, lighting a cigar.

"uh, not for a while, actually. Dr. Brown wants to meet with you, Richtofen. He's interested in the DG weapons and the teleporters you built, and he's wants to incorporate them on the _Rise of the Morning Sun_."  
>"I'd be glad to help the doctor." Richtofen said, gigging a little.<p>

"are you sure you're alright?" John asked.

"he's a little messed up, probably from all the 115 that's been absorbed by his body." Dempsey growled.

"hmm. Alright then, if you guys got your weapons, let's meet the rest of the squad."  
>"hey John, I would imagine that you have a bunch of aircraft in the hanger bays on a ship this big, can I see what you got?" a Russian asked.<p>

"what's your name?"  
>"uh, my friends just call me Nikolai."<br>"hmm, that'll be hard, differentiating you between the other Nikolai. You got a name?"  
>"yeah, it's Marco Ramius. Well, actually that's not my name. when I was young, I ran away from and had my name legally changed to that. I don't even remember my real name. So I just go by that, or Nikolai."<br>"alright then, Ramius. I'll show you the secondary hanger bay." John said, smiling. He had noticed long ago that there were multiple launch tubes and hanger bays all over the ship, he could understand why Group 851 would want to arm this ship up so heavily if they were gonna take it against the Covenant.

"wow."  
>"you could say I'm paranoid, but I'd rather be safe then dead."<br>"so which one's mine?"  
>"they're all yours, you just have to choose them. But choose wisely, it wouldn't make much sense going into a battlefield in an Hornet when you need a Pelican troop carrier. But the ship's pilots will probably help you on that." Johns aid.<br>"right, okay." Ramius muttered, not really listening. He was practically drooling over the amount of aircraft John had stashed in the hanger bay. And this was only one of the bays, he had plenty more vehicles. John decided to leave him alone with his airplanes for a while. He headed back to the main cafeteria where he saw everyone chit-chatting with each other. It was rather clear that they were all getting along, although there was still an air of hostility between the ODST's and the SPARTAN's. He also noticed that everyone was a bit on edge with the Arbiter. Personally, John couldn't blame them. Hopefully, all that would go away in the upcoming weeks.

"so, what's the plan, Chief?" Jun asked.

"well, as soon as Doc gets this ship modified with what he wants, my plan is to go back in time to when we first encountered the Covenant on Harvest and stop it from going south. If it does, well, I think we all know what's gonna happen after that." John said.

"yeah, we all do." Jun muttered, pulling out a cigarette. John made a mental note to have Cortana find all the documents concerning the SPARTAN-III program.

December 31st, 2553

While all the soldiers were getting to know each other better, Dr. Brown was meeting Dr. Richtofen.

"Dr. Richtofen, I'm Dr. Emmett Brown. I know a lot of the technologies and weapons you created while you were stationed at Der Riese. I have a proposition for you."  
>"and what would that be?" the former Nazi asked.<p>

"I'm looking to upgrade the _Rise of the Morning Sun_. I'm talking about teleporters, wunderwaffe-based weaponry, the whole kit and kaboodle. What do you say?"  
>Richtofen looked rather giddy about the thought of having DG weapons onboard, especially the Wunderwaffe DG-2.<p>

"I guess I'll take that as a yes."  
>"just one question, do you have the proper materials to make Wunderwaffe-based weaponry? And especially the Element 115, that is a very crucial element, pardon the pun, to creating Wunderwaffe weapons."<br>"that's where you come in. I have the materials to create the weapons, but I don't really know how to find Element 115."  
>"I can find it for you, doctor."<br>"good. Well, shall we get the show on the road, then?"

"yes, let's get the show on the road." Richtofen, his weird smile returning. He and Richtofen met up with the rest of the soldiers and told them that their mission was now beginning; the very first step they had to do to actually complete it was find a large source of Element 115.

"so, we're gonna go kick some Covenant ass?" Johnson asked.

"not yet, me and Richtofen are gonna modify the ship a little bit, to do that, we're gonna need vast amounts of ununpentium."  
>"I thought you could only create that in a lab." Kat replied.<p>

"not the one Richtofen and I need. It's dark red in color, and he says the only way we can find it is in asteroids and meteors."  
>"that's gonna take a while, you sure we have that much time?" Dutch asked.<p>

"I'm pretty sure we have all the time in the world, Dutch." MacTavish remarked, lighting his cigar.

"he's right, we do have all the time in the world."  
>"just one question: wouldn't admiral Hood get suspicious if we're gone for a long time?" Jorge asked.<p>

"we'll move fast then. I'll modify the ship's sensors to start looking for 115, but this could take a while. I'll head to the bridge to start modifying the sensors." Brown said.  
>"don't bother, I already did that. The best place in the galaxy to gather ununpentium is at the Rishi Maize asteroid field." Kat said, a smirk on her face. It appeared she came out of nowhere.<p>

"you already modified the sensors, that was quick." Ghost said.

"well doctor, wanna get started?" John asked.

Rishi Maize asteroid field

08:13 military time

January 1st, 2554

The UNSC _Rise of the Morning Sun_ appeared at the Rishi Maize asteroid field. As promised, Element 115 was there.

"damn, sensors are going way above the limit. This whole asteroid field is nothing but element 115. Richtofen, we hit the jackpot!" Brown said excitedly. Finding 115 was easy. Harvesting it was the hard part. For the next several days, the entire crew was working in EVA suits harvesting 115 from the asteroids. Everyone except Miranda, Brown and Richtofen. Brown and Richtofen were busy modifying the 115 so it could be used for weapons and the ship. Miranda was in the bridge, getting herself familiarized with her new command, although it was unofficial.

"hey Chief, you wanna tell us why we're out here grabbing some unknown material out of space rocks?" MacTavish yelled.

"Richtofen and Brown believe that this element can be of use to us. Those two are the smartest people we have, except for Cortana."  
>"and what does Cortana think?" Castro asked, using a laser torch to chisel away some of the rock.<p>

"I agree with Richtofen and Doc Brown, element 115 has very useful properties we can use to our advantage." Cortana said from John's helmet.

"I do not think any of us are complaining, SPARTAN, but I just hope this element is not lethal. Not to us, at least." the Arbiter said, holding a large glowing red rock over his shoulder and using his EVA suit's thrusters to get him to the _Morning Sun_.

"why else would we be harvesting it?" John smirked. Inside the _Morning Sun_, Brown and Richtofen were busy modifying the 115. They were in a large laboratory surrounded by advanced equipment and element 115. It was long, meticulous, and extremely frustrating work.

"okay, shave it off right here, just a hair. Set the laser to .0005 gigahertz, not a decimal more." Richtofen said.

"okay, .0005 gigahertz. Is that enough?"  
>"yes. Alright, give the 115 to me, I'll put it with the rest."<p>

Brown then moaned and rubbed his left temple.

"you alright?"  
>"It's just a headache."<br>"115 does that to you when first encountered."  
>"is it lethal?"<br>"not at all. All it does is give a person above-average strength."  
>"huh."<p>

And with that, they continued harvesting the element needed for the teleporters and DG weapons. Which weren't built yet. No one else knew that, however. Once they had finished harvesting all the element 115 in the asteroid,

"okay guys, we're finished here. Let's get the mission started." John said. He sounded rather tired, however. Probably from all the EVA work he did. But it wasn't that, however. He didn't know it, and neither did anyone else except Richtofen, but he was suffering from the effects of prolonged exposure to 115. When he got on the ship, he took his helmet off and rubbed his head, sighing in pain.

"you alright, Chief?" Sgt. Foley asked.

"yeah, I just got a massive migraine. Oh god, feels like someone's putting a white-hot poker through my fucking skull!" he muttered through clenched teeth.

"I feel the same way, John." Dutch muttered, massaging his temples. The whole crew was feeling the effects, except for Miranda, Richtofen, Dempsey, Takeo and Nikolai. She wasn't affected by it because she was up in the bridge, getting to know her new bridge crew.

"you four aren't having migraines?" Mickey grumbled.

"nope, I don't feel any different." Dempsey said.

"that's odd." John muttered. After a few moments, the migraines stopped.

"I don't feel different. Do you guys?"  
>"I feel fine." Jorge replied, rubbing the back of his head.<p>

"someone get Richtofen, he's gonna answer some questions." John muttered. They didn't have to find him; he found them.

"hey Richtofen, what's with this element of yours, it's giving me a headache." Woods muttered.

"that's natural, American-" he sneered with superiority.  
>"I don't care if it's natural or not, what's it doing to us?" Carter demanded.<p>

"all it does is give a person above-average strength. It usually takes a full day or so for the effects to happen, but come tomorrow, everyone of us should feel a lot stronger."  
>"and what about the SPARTANS?"<p>

"I'll have to look more into the augmentations, but I don't think it'll have any adverse side effects on the SPARTANS."

"one more thing, why hasn't it affected everyone already, we've been at this for weeks." Reznov sighed.

"element 115 takes a while for it to affect people. That's why it took so long." Richtofen answered.

"alright people, we've done enough work today, let's hit the hay." John ordered.

January 14th, 2553

_Rise of the Morning Sun_

Everyone awoke the next day. They all felt a tiny bit different, however. Just like Richtofen said, everyone except the SPARTAN's felt a stronger then they originally were. They were no where near the strength of a SPARTAN, but they were definitely stronger then your average human soldier. The SPARTAN's, however, felt different as well. Seeing as it was morning, and their hormones were at their highest, they all felt horny, a rather new feeling for all of them because the augmentations took that feeling away. For some reason, Carter and John felt more horny then the other SPARTAN's. probably because Carter now had lustful thoughts in his head about Kat, and John had the same thoughts about Cortana. John decided to find out what was going on with him. Quickly finding Dr. Richtofen,

"Richtofen, what's going with me, I feel different." john said, his hand resting awfully close to his crotch. Richtofen took notice of that.

"aw yes, I know what's going on. I took a look at the augmentations the SPARTAN's endured. One of them represses the SPARTAN's sex drive, to some extent actually. It makes so that not only do you not have the lustful thoughts normal humans have, your sexual organs do not work as well. But it appears that element 115 reverses that implant to the fullest extent."  
>"so, is it gonna be permanent?"<br>"I think so, yes."  
>"okay then." John said. He then left the room.<p>

"where are you going?" Richtofen asked.

"uh, bathroom."  
>Richtofen had a pretty good idea what John was going to do: whack off to a mental-image of Cortana. And that's exactly what he did. He never told anyone, however, he didn't want them to think he was a pervert.<p>

"so Chief, when are we gonna kick some Covie ass?" Woods asked.

"as soon as Richtofen and Brown finish with their weapons. I don't know when that will be." John muttered. Seeing as Richtofen had the schematics to construct the Wunderwaffe DG-1 and Wunderwaffe DG-2 weapons, building those weapons were rather quick. In Richtofen and Browns science lab, Woods decided to visit.

"hey Richtofen, Brown, when you guys gonna finish building those weapons?"

"uh, it'll actually take a while to construct them. But we can build them during the mission, if you'd like."  
>"look, all I want is to kick some Covenant ass, we all do. And we're getting rather anxious, so when are we gonna get the show on the road?"<br>"alright, listen up. This is actually going to take a while. If you and everyone else wants to kill a bunch of people, I'm pretty sure we can accommodate your needs."  
>"like what, Insurrectionists?" Woods sarcastically asked.<p>

"whatever works." Richtofen muttered, holding up a pistol-like frame. In the mess hall,

"so, what'd they say?" Emile asked.

"nothing."  
>"dammit, I need to kill some Covenant assholes or I'm gonna flip out!" Emile yelled.<p>

"Emile, just calm down." Kennedy muttered.

"I say we find some Insurrectionists to keep ourselves busy." Mason said.

"hmm, I guess that'll work." Emile muttered, twirling his kukri around on his index finger. So they took the _Rise of the Morning Sun_ to an asteroid belt in a planetary system where an unknown Insurrectionist faction used them as training bases. Number of Insurrectionist personal: 48,500,000 souls.

"48,500,000 enemy soldiers. Gonna be one helluva fight." Jun muttered.

"eh, I figured it'd be good training for when we deal with the Covenant. Not to mention the ship's Marines can help us out." Woods muttered.

"alright, then. Cortana, once you dock the ship, transfer yourself to a data chip."  
>"any reason why we're gonna be shooting Innies?" Cortana asked.<p>

"it'll take a while for Richtofen and Brown to build their weapons. So Woods thought it'd be good to shoot at Innies to train ourselves when we fight against the Covenant."  
>"you do realize that the Insurrectionists are nothing compared to the Covenant."<br>"well, I gotta keep myself busy, or I'll go crazy with boredom." John muttered, readying his MA5C rifle. Once the ship was docked,

"ready? GO, NOW!" John yelled. The hatch opened and gunfire erupted between the two groups. The Innies poured in everything they had, but it wasn't enough, not when a bunch of SPARTAN's and UNSC marines were on the other end. But fighting against 48,500,000 soldiers wasn't easy, even if you were a SPARTAN. Because the airlock wasn't exactly a massive space to pour an entire squadron of soldiers into, they had to send the soldiers out in single-file line, leaving them open to snipers. So the SPARTAN's went first, taking out any snipers they saw. But the Innies were well prepared, with M247 machinegun turrets and missile turrets set up to hold back any attacker. Apparently, the Innies were afraid the UNSC would find them, and heavily armed the place. Hell, getting the ship to the asteroid was bad enough; the Innies heavily armed the space rock with anti-starship missile batteries and gun emplacements. Cortana destroyed them with the _Morning Sun_'s missile batteries. But the real fight was still getting started.

January 16th, 2553

"I choose a spot to get practice, and we end up nearly getting our asses shot off." Woods sighed.

"hey, it wasn't your fault, no one would've known of this." Makarov muttered, reloading his M4 assault rifle.

"hey Captain, did ONI know of this place?" Kat asked.

"ONI doesn't really keep track of Insurrectionist fortifications, because they're always moving. I have a feeling this'll take a while." Veronica sighed, drinking some water from her canteen.

"what, taking this fortress, or getting the ship ready to fight the Covenant?" Jorge asked.

"probably both." Reznov muttered, reloading his machine gun. The next day, they fought in the hallways of the massive star base, retaking the fortress room by room, corridor by corridor.

"need some more clam for the chowder, here!" Kennedy yelled rather angrily. That was just his way of saying 'I'm out of ammo, I need more!'

"here!" Castro yelled, giving the former president more grenades for his China Lake grenade launcher.

"Ramirez! Get to the top of that platform and secure that MG!" Foley yelled. The Hispanic soldier did just that, although he did suffer some gunshot wounds to his arms. He collapsed on the stairs, unable to finish his mission. MacTavish had to do it for him instead. All he really did was chuck a grenade behind the sand bags. He then thought of something interesting. What if he could take some soldiers and ambush the Innies through the air vents?  
>"Ghost, Roach, you two are with me. We're going through the air vents to clean out the rest of the station."<p>

They proceeded to shoot out one of the air ducts and climb in. everyone except MacTavish, who was roughly pulled down and thrown on his back.

"and where are you going?" Master Chief coldly asked.

"I'm taking a couple of men through the air ducts, help clean out the station from the inside. Innie's won't know what hit them."

"alright, go ahead. Try not to get your balls shot off." John remarked. While he was helping the Scottish captain inside the duct,

"since when did you get a sense of humor?" Cortana asked.

"since I got a soldier who knows how to fight." John replied.

"you do know that most of these men and women aren't SPARTAN's. just you and Noble Team. You can't push 'em past their limits."

"who said I was pushing them?" John asked. No reply.

"hey Chief, where's Soap, Roach, and Ghost?" Price asked.

Everyone then heard a bunch of banging coming up from above, along with some shouting. All the gunfire stopped so everyone could hear what was happening above their heads.

"GHOST, GET YOUR FUCKING RIFLE OUTTA MY ASS!"  
>"SORRY, SIR, IT'S NOT MY FAULT YOU CHOSE TO AMBUSH INNIES IN THE FUCKING AIR VENTS!"<p>

"GHOST, EITHER YOU SHUT THE FUCK UP OR IT'S LATRINE DUTIES FOR A MONTH!"  
>"CAPTAIN, YOU MIND TELLING ME WHAT WE'RE DOING UP HERE AGAIN?"<p>

"JUST FOLLOW MY LEAD!"

More thumping was heard, and suddenly gunfire erupted from the ducts a couple meters away, catching the Innie's off guard, killing many of them. The fight resumed; the UNSC soldiers captured a lot of the Insurrectionist star-base. They still had plenty to go, however. John found out that using the ship's entire contingent of Marines back-fired; there were simply too large a group. So he ordered that only the ODST's, the SPARTAN's, and the men he abducted would take the base, everyone stay behind to defend the ship should it be boarded. So when they finally took the base, over two whole months had passed.

March 17th, 2553

"hey guys, does this remind you of when the Americans took Iwo Jima?" Takeo asked.

"yeah. What was supposed three days was instead around four months, is that right?" Makarov asked.

"it doesn't matter. We took it. Lot of practice, though." Price chuckled.

"yeah, it wasn't as bad for you because you're a sniper. You get to stay back. Hell, why did the Innie's fortify this place so heavily, were they expecting us?" Bowman asked.

"maybe. I'll try and crack the computers, see what they were planning." Kat muttered, reloading her assault rifle.

"you sure you can do that?" Dunn asked.

"trust me, Kat is probably the best computer hacker we have. You want something the enemy has, she'll get it for you." Carter answered.

"I thought Cortana was the best." Johnson muttered through his cigar.

"okay, Kat's the second best." Carter muttered.

"okay, I got something." Kat said aloud. Reznov and Foley picked themselves up and went over to a large computer screen.

"hey Cpt. Dare, where's ONI HQ?" Reznov asked.

"I can't exactly tell you that, not in your security clearance."  
>"whether it's in our clearance or not, we got something that'll interest you. These guys here were planning something big, and with Earth's defenses as it is, they might've pulled it off." Foley said.<p>

"like what, disable a UNSC frigate?" Mickey joked.

"these guys were gonna bomb Earth, more specifically, what appears to be ONI headquarters hidden in northern Montana." Kat said loudly. MacTavish spat out his cigar.

"what?"  
>"they wanted to bomb ONI HQ. because Earth isn't exactly heavily defended at the moment, they figured they could do it easily. And they were afraid that the UNSC would find them, that's why this place was so heavily armed." Reznov said.<p>

"like I said, lots of practice." Woods muttered. No one really said anything contradictory to that. After resting for a while, everyone gathered themselves and went back to the _Morning Sun_, leaving behind a nice present for anyone else to use the station: a NOVA bomb fused together with the station's primary power reactor.

"how will that bomb go off, exactly?" the Arbiter asked.

"I got it rigged up with remote detonator. Once we're far away, I hit the button, and that Insurrectionist station will be gone. Should make a nice fireball." John muttered, bouncing the detonator up-and-down in his hand.

"I wouldn't toss that detonator around so casually, if you hit it the wrong way, then we're all dead." Cortana reminded him.

"alright then." John muttered, holstering the device. Once the UNSC Supercarrier was far away, John hit the detonator. A massive fireball erupted, turning the asteroid belt into literally nothing.

"told you it'd make a big fireball." John replied. He and the Arbiter were actually watching the explosion on a computer screen, no way in hell the Supercarrier could survive a NOVA bomb. Nothing could, those weapons were the most deadliest and devastating weapons humanity had made.

"so, now that we're done with our 'practice', are those weapons of yours finished?" Eddie Buck asked Eddie Richtofen.

"we're almost finished with our weapons, but we still have quite a ways to go."  
>"dammit, can't you speed it up faster, I wanna kill some Covie bastards." Ghost muttered.<p>

"look. Doc Brown and I are currently working on a DG-based super weapon, and that's gonna take time. Alright, I'll talk to Brown and see if we can't get the time traveling on the road. But you guys are gonna have to be patient."

Ghost and Buck weren't happy. But they didn't have a choice, none of them did. Over the past two months taking the Insurrectionist station, everyone bonded together rather well, a lot better and faster then John-117 originally thought. There were still some air of hostility between the SPARTAN's and ODST's, but that would soon go away. John had to keep his mouth shut, however. He never told anyone else that he was the cause of the ODST-SPARTAN rivalry. And if what happened between him and the ODST's on the _Atlas_ were to get out, then a shootout between the SPARTAN's and Helljumpers would possibly erupt. He couldn't have that happen, not now.

"you alright Chief?" Cortana asked.

"yeah, I'm fine." John muttered, albeit distantly. Cortana knew her SPARTAN, and she could tell that John definitely wasn't fine. The next day, John was in the rifle range testing out an M14 rifle. Dempsey walked in and tested his hand on a DMR.

"so, Chief, who are we going after this time?" Dempsey asked.

"we got an unusual horde of Covenant Loyalists amassing near the Epsilon system. We could go after them so we can get a feel of fighting the Covenant."

"huh. Hey Chief, this may be a bad time to ask, but if we're going against the Covenant, I think everyone except maybe the SPARTAN's and the ODST's need new battle armor." Dempsey said. John smiled.

"I got just the thing."

He put his rifle down and left the range, Dempsey following him. They went to the mess hall where everyone was downing drinks and sharing stories when they fought the Innies at the bunker.

"computer, open file _Master Chief-battle armor-delta-omega-5B_." John said aloud. Slots on the far left wall in the mess hall slowly turned around to reveal several suits of advanced ODST battle armor.

"what's the hell's that?" Kennedy asked.

"you're new armor. I got enough suits for a squadron twice this size."  
>"what exactly is the new armor?" Ghost asked.<p>

"basically, it's your average ODST ballistic armor jacked up on steroids. It comes with energy shielding, hardened ballistics gel and outer titanium alloy armor, and an enhanced HUD-system, along with waterproof and vacuum-proof seals. Also comes with a respiratory system allowing the wearer to wear the suit during EVA activity. Downside is, it only comes with 35 minutes of breathable air, I couldn't squeeze more in."

"it comes with energy shielding?" Buck asked, somewhat impressed.

"I managed to reverse engineer the shielding on MJONIR armor and slap it on the new armor. Oh, and it also comes with a jetpack, in case you guys were wondering."

"who built all this?" MacTavish asked, now up and inspecting the armor.

"Doc Brown, Cortana and I worked endlessly to built the armor, so I'm pretty sure it's quality stuff." everyone except Noble Team was now up and checking out the armor.

"so can we use these against the Covenant?" Dempsey asked.

"um, that's a little problem. Other then the SPARTAN's and ODST's, you guys aren't exactly ready to fight the Covenant. Not yet, at least. We're gonna have to train you up a little bit." John said.

"what do you mean, train us up?" Dempsey asked, a little worried. John looked at Noble Team and Dare's ODST's and smiled. For the next several weeks, the SPARTAN's and ODST's had the 141, including Richtofen, Brown, the Arbiter, but excluding Miranda Keyes, go through a rather hastily constructed boot camp meant to train them soldiers to fight against the Covenant. Truth to be told, they weren't ready. Yet. With the new training, they would become the black op squadron John envisioned them to be. When it was all over, they set out to find any Covenant opposition and destroy them.

June 24th, 2553

_UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun_

Unidentified planet, Covenant Loyalist-held territory

"what do you think, Kennedy, would this work?" Dare asked. The former United States president studied the planet closely.

"I think it'll work. Besides, it'll give us a good chance at getting ready to fight the Covenant." he said, cocking his China Lake. They all boarded Pelicans and headed down to the moon, where they were all nearly shot down by anti-air Wraiths. They landed on the ground, however, but were nearly shot to pieces. Once again, John ordered that his squad go down, the ship's Marines stay behind to guard the ship. He figured the squad would need to practice fighting against the Covenant should they get caught in a situation where there was no help.

"the Demon is here! I will take his head as a trophy!" a War Chieftain cried out when he saw John-117. He charged the lone SPARTAN and swung his gravity hammer with the intent of killing the soldier. John just caught the hammer, swung it around and landed a devastating blow to the brutes left ribcage, killing him instantly.

"not today, pal." John hoarsely muttered. The group of human-and one Elite-soldiers continued to fight up the beach head, knowing that because of all the Brutes stationed here, this fight would take forever. Not to mention that there was an abnormally large amount of Hunters on the moon as well.

"aw, come on!" Woods yelled in anger when he saw two Hunters stomp toward him. He raised his Commando and fired, but the bullets harmlessly bounced off the Hunters shields. He did the smart thing, he ran. He found a weapons cache and picked up a Javelin rocket launcher. He got a tone, but knew the rocket couldn't blast through the shield. Once the Hunter raised his shield to strike the final blow,

"say goodbye, motherfuckers." Woods muttered, pulling the trigger. One down, one to go. The other Hunter was blown to pieces soon after because he pulled off the same trick. Woods sighed as he dropped the launcher and picked up his trusty Commando. He hoped he would never have to face another Hunter ever again. Meanwhile, further down the beach, Shepherd, Foley, Ramirez, Dunn, MacTavish, Ghost, Roach, and Price were engaged in a massive shootout with grunts and brutes.

"how many of these fucking Grunts do they have?" Ghost screamed.

"I don't know, just keep shooting, they'll run out eventually!" Price replied.

"when, when we run outta bullets?" Dunn sarcastically replied.

"just keep firing, we'll hold out!" Shepherd yelled. Oddly enough, he was duel-wielding his M4 Grenadier assault rifle with an M247 heavy machine gun using a strap on his shoulder to hold it up. While the rest of the squad moved deeper into the beachhead and into the buildings that lay residing, Shepherd and the others were pinned down. Two days later, they haven't moved a single inch upward, and they were running dangerously low on ammunition. But Shepherd kept their hope up, and so they continued fighting. By the end of the third day, they were reduced to having to use their side arms and captured Covenant weapons. The Brutes had to give them their due, they held out longer then was expected. But now they were going to die. Or so the Covenant thought. On the beachhead, a tired Gen. Hershel Shepherd addressed his men.

"okay men, we're gonna charge 'em. And were gonna run-and-gun 'em until either they're dead or we're dead. So stock up only on weapons and ammo, leave everything else behind." Shepherd said.

"okay guys, fix bayonets. If you have 'em." Shepherd muttered. He was armed with a Covenant plasma repeater. MacTavish had his M4 rifle, so he put his bayonet on. Ghost had a Brute Shot. Roach traded his ACR for a MA5B rifle, but didn't put on a bayonet. Price still had his Intervention, so he slapped his bayonet on as well. Foley was armed with a Spiker, Dunn had duel-wield plasma pistols, and Ramirez used a Concussion rifle. After checking one last time,

"CHARGE!" Shepherd screamed. The small squad of outnumbered and outgunned human soldiers ran into the much larger squad of Brutes, Grunts and Jackals, catching the Covenant off-guard. They were rather shocked to see them run at them like that, firing their weapons. They tore through the front wall of Brutes, laying waste to them like they were nothing. Blood and guts were everywhere. Shepherd looked like a soldier gone insane, with all the Brute guts decorating his bare chest. The Brutes knew that they didn't stand a chance, so they retreated, leaving the Grunts and Jackals to fend for themselves. But they wouldn't live to see tomorrow morning. After wasting the grunts and jackals, they ran after the fleeing brutes. They showed no mercy to the animals, firing at them as they ran. The brutes were soon mowed down. One was still alive, however. Shepherd grabbed his combat knife and hurled it at the cowardly brute. It struck him in the back. Shepherd quickly ran over and repeatedly stabbed the brute in the back, again and again, like how Mel Gibson hacked the British soldier in _Patriot_ after he rescued his son. The men were rather shocked to see their normally calm leader lose it. When he was done, he just sat there on his knees, brute blood and intestines dripping down his face and chest. Suddenly, he yelled out a loud war cry that would make Rambo proud. When he was done, he got up, holstered his knife, and picked up his repeater.

"let's find everyone else." he muttered. They had no idea that the rest of the squad was high atop a massive Brute fortification. And they were impressed and shocked by what Shepherd did.

"think we should give him a medal?" Dempsey asked.

"nah, let him celebrate his own way." John replied.

During the night, Shepherd and his men were huddled around a campfire with their weapons held tightly.

"hey Shepherd, what happened back there?" Roach asked.

"I don't know, I guess I just lost it." Shepherd replied.

"well, I'm glad you're on our side, not the Covenant." Price chuckled. Shepherd didn't reply at that.

"hey, where's everyone else?" Dunn asked.

"I don't know. Dead, scattered, maybe they left us." Ghost said behind his skull balaclava.

"I don't know. Get some rest, we're gonna need it." Shepherd said, lying on the cold sand. Everyone soon fell asleep. Not for long however, they soon heard the sound of footsteps in the sand.

"UP AND AT 'EM, KNOCK 'EM DOWN!" Shepherd screamed. It was his code for, 'get up, grab your guns, and start killing people.' the soldiers grabbed their weapons and let loose a hail of plasma, bullet, and grenade fire all around them.

"SHEPHERD, STAND DOWN, THAT'S AN ORDER!" John yelled over the gunfire. But Shepherd thought it was a trick, so he and his men continued firing. They saw dark figures in the distance.

"they're all over the place!" Ghost yelled.

"keep shooting!" Price replied. Eventually, they ran outta ammunition and were now defenseless. However, it was now morning. They managed to hold off the rest of the squad the whole night.

"what do we do?" Foley asked.

"we surrender, we can't fight anymore." Shepherd said. The brute blood and guts were now dry on his face and chest, so he looked rather imposing. The squad of American and British soldiers walked out with their hands above their heads. To their surprise, they saw the rest of the squad walking towards them. With their guns out. Shepherd was desperately hoping they wouldn't shoot him and his men.

"I gotta hand it to you, Shepherd, holding off a bunch of SPARTAN's and ODST's is rather admirable." Buck said with a smile.

"next time, instead of walking into the damn camp, just shout out so we don't get into another firefight!" Shepherd yelled angrily.

"what's all that?" Richtofen asked, pointing to Shepherd's chest.  
>"the remains of a Brute." Shepherd snarled. Shepherd and his men harshly pushed past the rest of the squad and walked to the LZ.<p>

"what the hell's his problem?" Mickey asked.

"he's probably pissed at us because we didn't help him on the beach." Emile remarked. Two weeks later, they finished the fight on the moon. Shepherd and his men were still angry that they didn't receive help on the beach, but they eventually let that pass. John, however, was rather wary of Shepherd. He wondered if he would ever lose his cool again like when he stabbed the fleeing Brute to death.

August 23rd, 2553

_UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun_

After two more months of vicious fighting with rogue Covenant loyalists, the men and women of the _UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun_ felt they could take on the entire Covenant military. Normally, any other crew would want to stop fighting. But this crew knew that their supercarrier could go back in time, and they wanted to prevent the Human-Covenant War from happening. The supercarrier looked rather different, on the inside. Large teleporters were scattered throughout the ship. They were usually in rather important rooms, such as the main hanger bay, the main armory, the bridge, Richtofen and Brown's laboratory, and, oddly enough, the mess hall, which was the largest room on the ship, due to Dr. Brown making adjustments to it before the war ended. That day, however, Dr. Brown and Dr. Richtofen called everyone in the mess hall.

"so, what'd you call us for?" Kennedy asked, slinging his China Lake over his suit. No-one really knew why, but Kennedy, McNamara, and Nixon all still wore their suits, instead of military uniforms. However, they did wear Kevlar vests modified to project an energy shield, and they wore vests that held more ammunition for their respective weapons. They didn't like the feel of ODST battle armor, preferring the looseness of their suits.

"many of you, actually, all of you have been nagging us when we're finally gonna go back and stop the war from happening. And Richtofen and I always replied…."  
>"that we're busy making a DG-based super weapon and that it would take time." everyone replied. They were now beginning to believe that their so called super weapon was a lie.<p>

"well, we're gonna present you our finished products." Richtofen said, pulling out a remote from his pants. Several slots in the wall behind him moved 180 degrees revealing several advanced weapons. Very advanced, it was clear that they were all human in design, but they were far deadlier then the standard weapons they had in the armory.

"these are the weapons we've been working on. DG weapons, model 1 through 11. The first one, the DG-1..." Richtofen said, picking up a red-colored pistol-like weapon that looked like a ray gun from 1950's Earth science fiction.

"…..shoots out regular plasma bolts. Deals a high level of damage to personal and body protection alike. Against shields, usually 10 rounds will do the trick to bring 'em down. It's semi-automatic, but I modified the trigger system so all you half to do is pull down the trigger and it'll fire continuously, until you run out. Has a maximum of 180 rounds, but it requires a rather strong stance, as firing the weapon will push the user back a few millimeters. To reload, you pull the barrel open, toss the battery out, put a new one in, close the barrel. This…." Richtofen continued, pulling off a rifle-looking weapon from the wall.

"….is the DG-2. It's mostly a room-clearing weapon, holds up to 20 rounds in the magazine. It fires a ball of highly-charged electricity, and it can carry from one body to another, effectively eliminating a whole group of enemy soldiers. It can also be used against single enemy combatants, but that's actually a waste of ammo. To reload, you pull these light bulbs off the side of the rifle, slap new ones on." Richtofen finished, putting the rifle back on the rack. He then grabbed a large, cannon-like weapon off the wall racks.

"the DG-3. Fires a large blast of air that can send any enemy infantry backwards, no matter who they are. Whether they be Hunters or Brutes, they can't stand up to this. To reload, you pull this large disk out from behind the main barrel and put a new one in. Oh, and here's a warning. You don't want to fire this weapon close a physical obstruction, it tends to send the user backwards."

"this is the DG-4." Brown said, pulling an M-16 off the wall. "we modified it to fire red plasma bolts that can fry an enemy soldier. Just think of fried shit."  
>"I like fried shit. Especially onion rings." Dempsey muttered.<p>

"the DG-5 is one of the more deadly weapons we built." Brown muttered, grabbing an RPG-7 that was modified, heavily.

"it's completely anti-material, is plasma based, and can punch right through the armor of a Spirit or Phantom dropship with one shot. You don't need to reload this, never runs outta ammo. You have to let it recharge, though, because if it overheats then it'll explode, and either seriously maim or kill the user."  
>"does it have black-lash like regular rocket launchers? You know, send a blast of smoke from the exhaust nozzle?" Mickey asked.<p>

"that's the beauty of this weapon, it doesn't do that. Okay, moving on." Brown said, putting the weapon back on the wall.

"the DG-6. Quite possibly the most devastating we built. Works just like a regular grenade, but when you pull the pin, it can vaporize whatever is in it's blast radius. The radius is around 2 meters, so it's best that when you chuck these things, you really have to hurl them." Richtofen said with a sadistic grin on his face.

"then why'd you have 'em built?" Johnson asked.

"these thing'll turn a squad of Hunters into mush with one toss. You still want it?" Richtofen asked. No one really contradicted the doctor on that.

"hmm." he muttered. After carefully putting the grenade back on the rack, he grabbed a Springfield '03 rifle with a scope.

"the DG-7 rifle. It's pinpoint accurate, can blast through a fully shielded elite with one shot, and the bolt doesn't have to be worked, it's semi-auto."  
>"how accurate is that thing?" Price asked.<p>

"I took it down to the range earlier today, fired it a total of 581 times. Bulls-eye every single time. The clip holds 5 charges, so use them carefully, they're very powerful. But I got a feeling that you snipers are really gonna enjoy this weapon." Richtofen said with a smile. He put the rifle back on the wall and grabbed a Browning M2 .50 cal machine gun. He couldn't hold it, however, so he had to put down on the ground, holding it by the barrel.

"this…is the DG-8. Whew, man that thing is heavy. Anyway, it's a plasma machinegun turret can be carried by SPARTAN's and Elites like a regular rifle. Regular soldiers and personal can't use it, because it's too heavy. It can blast through just about anything, biological that is. But enough fire from this thing can bring a Hunter down easily. You don't have to reload this thing, ammo is unlimited."

"so is there a counterpart to that, one that regular marines can use?" Dare asked. Richtofen put the DG-8 back on the rack, rested a bit, and pulled off a smaller weapon, one that looked like an old FG-42 machinegun.

"the DG-9. I built it so regular soldiers can have the firepower of the DG-8 in a much lighter weapon. You don't have to reload this thing as well, however, it does tend to overheat a lot should you hold the trigger down continuously, this works better in small bursts."

Putting the DG-9 rifle back on the rack, Brown pulled a M90 shotgun off the wall.

"this is the final DG weapon we built. The DG-10 is basically a MAC gun in the size of a handheld weapon. It can blast through anything you set it's sights on. However, it comes with a stipulation. The kickback on this thing is so great, that you should only use this for heavy armor and artillery long distances away. It's not that great for up close combat. But it's one helluva weapon." Brown concluded.

John was rather impressed; 10 wonder weapons in a rather short time. And from what the two doctors told everyone, they were rather deadly.

"I'm impressed by what you two did, but where's your super weapon?" John asked.

"it's down in the main hanger deck, that's how large it is." Brown said. Everyone followed the two scientists to the main hanger deck. Of course, they had to take a large cargo elevator capable of moving three Pelicans to the deck because the walk would've taken too long.

"I don't think I've ever been down to the main hanger deck." John said.

"you never bothered to ask. Here we are." Brown said. The large doors opened up and they found themselves in a massive, cavernous bay.

"what's with all the cranes at the top?" John asked.

"think of it as a mobile refit-and-repair station; this ship has the ability to repair other vessels. And it can take apart ships if we want to."

"so where's your super weapon?" Miranda asked.

"down there." Brown pointed down to the main deck. There were two massive golden tubes that were easily 150 meters long. They had an odd glow to them, as if they were alive. They also had strange alien writing on the sides, as if they weren't human. John wondered if they were built by using Covenant technology. He didn't wanna press the matter; Brown would just say he wouldn't understand it. And he was right, most of the time; John never did understand what Brown was talking about most of the time. Everyone thought the two objects looked a large .50 cal round that had the chamber and the bullet-head removed from each other.

"the Wunderwaffe Cannon. I know I said it before, but I really mean this: this is _the _most devastating weapon onboard the ship."  
>"hmm. What's it capable of?" Kat asked, not really believing Dr. Brown.<p>

"well, it only has two settings: disable and eviscerate. Disable allows the gun to disable anything that has electronics, star bases, space stations, starships, you name it. Whether it be human or Covenant, it'll knock out whatever it touches. Eviscerate just allows the cannon to totally vaporize whatever the beam touches, whether it be artificial or natural. How it works is pretty damn amazing; we managed to reverse-engineer the Covenant energy projector they use on their capital ships. We rifled the inner chamber to such a fine point that that the energized matter can actually be guided by the coils inside the main barrel. When it reaches the end tip, the head actually opens up to allow the energy to be released." Brown said.

"but how does it disable ships?" Bowman asked.

"when that setting is activated, the coils and rifling inside the barrel emit an EMP/ECM field that we manipulated to be mixed in with the matter. When it hits anything electrical, the field and the matter combine and release an electrical burst that surrounds the object. It then immediately sends in an electrical feedback virus that overloads all the electrical systems, thus leaving the object disabled. For the eviscerate setting, we just simply channel more and more energy into the gun. The energy is then shot out at such a terrifying rate that it will burn through anything it touches. It can't destroy space, but it'll destroy anything else it touches, provided that you have the power to use it." Richtofen replied.  
>"you guys are fucking amazing." John muttered, looking at the yet-to-be-assembled cannon.<p>

"so when can we get this hooked up?" Woods asked.

"oh, um, hooking it up. We're currently working on another cannon, but they're both experimental prototypes. Meaning they release massive waves of element 115. It's not lethal, but it does have to be monitored."  
>"so, when's the second cannon gonna be finished, I want these weapons hooked up to the <em>Sun<em> as soon as possible." John ordered.

"the second gun is halfway finished, it should take us another 2 weeks." Brown muttered.

"can we at least see this one work?" Buck asked.

Brown and Richtofen looked at each other.

"yeah, I guess we can shoot it." Richtofen replied. They landed on a barren moon. Their target, a large mountain range. After they put the two pieces together and hooked it up to the main reactor,

"just barely clip the edge of the cliff face." John ordered.

"alright then, let's put it to, I don't know, how does 5 percent sound?" Brown asked.

"sound's good, Dr." Cortana said.

"alright, firing wunderwaffe cannon in five, four, three, two, one, firing cannon." Richtofen said, pressing the button. A massive wave of blueish plasma shot out from the cannon, vaporizing the entire mountain. Sparks flew all over the ship, destroying several computer consoles.

"what the hell was that, I said barely graze it!" John yelled.

"the gun sent an electric feedback through the main system, caused it to overload!" Cortana yelled back.

"can we not have it overload the next time?" Kat asked, annoyed.

"can't do it, gun's gonna overload all the time. But we can put all that extra energy somewhere useful, I just don't know where." Richtofen stated.

"can we put energy shielding on the ship?" Brown asked.

"not exactly, we'd have to have Covenant technology to do that." Cortana sighed.

"alright then, let's put the extra energy into the hull integrity, make the armor twice as strong. Should come handy for a firefight." Richtofen said, frantically typing up stuff on a computer console.

"Brown, Richtofen, Cortana, let's try it again. I don't want the gun to tear the ship in half. And this time, barely graze the mountain, set it to it's lowest setting." John ordered. Once again, they fired the Wunderwaffe Cannon. This time, the excess energy went into the hull, strengthening it greatly. Still, the beam vaporized the mountain completely.

"I said put it to it's lowest setting."  
>"that is it's lowest setting. IT'S AT ONE, FOR FUCK'S SAKE, WE CAN'T GO LOWER!" Richtofen yelled.<p>

"alright, alright, jeez. Guess we know how powerful it is. Alright, let's put it down on the planet surface, hook the second gun up." John said. They had absolutely no idea what horror they would face on the planet surface.

* * *

><p><strong>Like? Don't like? Any constructive criticism would be greatly appreciated. If any of the characters seem a little OOC, then please say so, so I can correct the problem and make the story better. Next chapter will be coming up soon.<strong>


	3. Chapter 2

**Halo and Call of Duty belongs to Microsoft, Bungie, Infinity Ward, and Treyarch. I only own the Morning Sun supercarrier, the Wunderwaffe Cannons, and Dr. Emmett Brown. This chapter will be the first to incorporate zombies, so if I got anything wrong, please notify me. Also, there will be a scene similar to Apocalypse Now. I don't own that movie either. Oh, and Carter and Kat's relationship will be taken a step further, you have been warned. Enjoy!**

* * *

><p>Chapter 2<p>

The _UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun_ Supercarrier gently landed on the planet surface. John knew it was capable of doing such a feat when he modified the walls for extra weapons. The SPARTAN's were at the front of the bow, along with massive cranes needed to actually hold the cannon in place while it was installed. The first gun was installed in zero-G, but without a proper space dock it wasn't the most easiest thing to do. John then asked that they install the second gun when they were on the surface. But even with some of the crew helping, it was still a seemingly impossible task. Especially in the rain. And it was pouring like there was no tomorrow. After about 8 hours of hard, wet labor, the second Wunderwaffe Cannon was installed. The SPARTAN's were tired, very tired. Even though they were the best soldiers onboard the ship, even they had their limits. In the bridge,

"okay, let's hook it up now." Richtofen muttered.

"what, it's not hooked up yet?" Emile yelled. Several of the marines and engineers groaned as well.

"what we did down there was just getting it on the hull. We still have to hook it up to the main reactor. That's gonna take a while. But we can do it all from the bridge. Go hit the showers, get some rest, you guys deserved it."

Everyone breathed a sigh of relief when they heard that they could rest. After a relaxing cold shower, they hit the barracks and slept for 3 straight hours. They then got up and headed to the mess hall, leaving their weapons and armor behind. Bad mistake. They found Kennedy giving out some speech about how everyone needs to look to the future, not how they should stay in the present or they would miss everything. John only chuckled at that; Kennedy, Jorge, McNamara, Castro, and Nixon all argued with each other plenty of times about how the government should rule over their people. John usually had to split up Castro and Jorge from killing each other on more then one occasion.

"what the hell are you spitting out this time, Jack?" John asked with a smirk.

"I'm just telling my friends here….." he stopped when they felt the ship shake. Suddenly, a bright light appeared out of nowhere, temporarily blinding everyone.

"what was that?" Castro asked, lighting his cigar.

"that was the discharge from the second gun. There was a lot of element 115 stored in the main matrix that would've caused massive damage to the ship had it been untouched, so we set it loose." Brown said, walking into the mess hall with Richtofen. He sat down next to John and handed him a data chip, Cortana.

"is it lethal?" Ghost asked.

"not to us, no." Richtofen said.

"Castro, what you did on that moon was rather reckless, we almost blew ourselves up!" McNamara said, standing up. John remembered the incident very well. The main squad was pinned down by dozens of Hunters, and hundreds of Brutes. Castro had the idea of overloading their plasma grenades and leave a trap for the Covenant soldiers. They did so, and it worked, but it almost killed everyone.

"now we sat down here today-"  
>"in good faith." Kennedy interjected.<p>

"…in good faith, to sort this thing out."

"then why is _he_ here? He's the worst shot I've ever seen with a grenade launcher!" Castro yelled, pointing at Nixon. Nixon's weapon of choice was an M-16 grenadier assault rifle. He was an expert with the rifle, but with the grenade launcher attachment, he was quite possibly one of the worst shots John had ever seen. John made a mental note to train Nixon himself when it came to using grenade launchers.

"as I like to say, keep your friends close, but those who are a bad shot closer. Now ladies, gentleman, I honestly believe that there are few generations-" Kennedy was cut off by the sound of banging.

"sound's like someone breaking in!" Nixon was up on his feet in an instant.

"it's just the storm dick, sit down." Foley said. Suddenly, the sound of glass being broken was heard, along with screaming and gunshots. And then another sound was heard, one that was familiar to Kennedy, Nixon, Castro, and McNamara. That same sound was also extremely familiar to Dempsey, Richtofen, Takeo, and Nikolai as well. It was one they hoped they would never have to face ever again. A zombie roaring it's trademark, high-pitch squeal.

"OH MY GOD!" Nixon yelled.

"FREAKSACKS! QUICK, BAR THE DOORS AND WINDOWS! STACK UP ON GUNS AND AMMO! GET NIKOLAI'S VODKA, NOW!" Dempsey screamed. Faster then even a SPARTAN could move, which is saying something, Dempsey, Nikolai, Richtofen, and Takeo were now attempting to bar the doors and windows leading into the mess hall with whatever they had. Which was a bunch of tables. You could definitely tell they were very paranoid when it came to zombies.

"what the hell are these things?" Dutch yelled.

"it appears the _Morning Sun_ has been breached." McNamara said, standing in front of Kennedy, who pushed him away.

"zombies. Ladies, gentleman, it is at times like these that our capacity to retaliate must be, and has to be massive, to deter all forms of aggression!" Kennedy then reached into his pocket, pulled out a remote, pressed the button, and the walls and ceiling of the mess hall turned around to reveal John's weapons cache. Kennedy 'borrowed' a remote control that would make the walls in the mess hall turn around to reveal the weapons. Dr. Brown and the Chief were expecting it back, however. The rear wall on the far side, for some reason, didn't turn around.

"people, lock and load."

"shit, we left our armor back at the barracks." Jun realized.

"no matter, I got something even better then our old armor." he walked over to the far wall that didn't turn around, slammed his fist on it two times, and then walked back as it turned around, revealing the MJOLNIR Mk. VII armor, the one he spent months creating.

"new armor for us SPARTAN's. don't ask me how long it took me to build it, it took forever. But it's much more advanced and much, much more deadlier then our old armor. I added a chainsaw on the left arm for melee attacks, and needle gun on the right arm for long range sniping missions. They're both hooked to your mind, so you might wanna be careful of that. But the best part is….." John said as he walked up to the middle suit with the numbers 117 etched on the front. He turned around so his back was facing it, and held tightly held his breath. The armor then slowly moved forward and seemed to come alive as it opened up and wrapped all around his legs, arms, hands and body. Note: if you're having a hard time picture thing, just picture Tony Stark getting into his armor in the movie Iron Man, but put John in place of Tony and put the MJOLNIR Mk. VII suit in place of Iron Man's suit.

"one size fit's all." he smirked. He reached up and grabbed his helmet, putting it on. Noble Team soon followed suit, although Kat had to remove her robotic prosthetic. The new one, however, worked just as good as, if not better, then her old one. With the new armor, the SPARTAN's looked more deadly and intimidating then ever. They all grabbed their weapons and formed a fire line with the rest of the team.

"one more thing, the needle gun and chainsaw are interchangeable, so if you want the saw on your right arm and the needle gun on your left arm, just switch 'em, not now however." John said.

"any last words, Mr. President?" Veronica asked sarcastically. John noticed that only he, Ghost, and Emile still wore their helmets, everyone else just let their faces show. He also noticed that only he, Noble Team, and Dare's ODST's wore their armor. Miranda wore her command uniform, and the Arbiter still wore his armor. But everyone else was wearing rather casual clothing, nothing meant to be used in a firefight.

"yes, Jack, any superlative words for our humble troops?" Nixon joined in on the sarcasm.

"pray not for easy lives, my friends. Pray that we'll come out stronger men and women." Kennedy said. And with that, the squad cocked their weapons and waited for the inevitable slaughter.

"Cortana, remind me again, do zombies carry guns like Flood combat forms?" John asked.

"you obviously haven't seen zombie movies, have you, zombies don't carry any weapons, they just run at you with their arms in front of them, screaming like a maniac." you could definitely tell she was smirking.

"that's good to know." he replied. A zombie busted a door down and ran inside, screaming and howling like a madman. The zombie was an undead male, somewhere in his late 30's. his eyes were a dark, glowing orange, and his face was covered in blood, probably from his latest victim. But who was it, the _Morning Sun_ was crewed by less than a skeleton crew. But that didn't matter. The zombie charged the group of soldiers, feeling his limbs being torn apart by gunfire. He fell to the floor, just short of his prize. But more would come, more would definitely come.

"hey Dempsey, Richtofen, Nikolai, Takeo. You four seem to know the most when it comes to zombies, what's their main strategy?" Buck asked. Richtofen and Takeo rolled their eyes. Dempsey and Nikolai scoffed at Buck's question.

"what?" the veteran ODST asked.

"you guys all think with military minds, these fucksacks don't have any main strategy. All they do is attack in waves. They don't care if they have to lose hundreds, if not thousands to achieve their objective. But if you want some military tactician advice, I'll give you one. One thing they love to do is try and make large groups scatter, they'll have an easier time getting their food a lot easier that way. So our best chance is that we stay together and pour in all the lead we got into these maggot sacks." Dempsey growled.

"and what's their food?" Shepherd asked.

"us." was all Dempsey said before firing his B.A.R into a zombie's head, causing it to explode. That's when the zombies attacked. In hordes, in waves, just like the marine said they would. Automatic gunfire filled the mess hall as zombies began pouring into the mess hall. It seemed like there was no end to the zombies. But as long as they had enough ammunition, which they did, they might be able to hold out. Problem was, the zombies kept attacking in massive waves, and the crudely constructed barricades soon fell.

"what happened to all the marines, shouldn't they be helping us?" Roebuck yelled. He soon got his answer; a zombie in a UNSC Marine combat gear came running toward them with a large bite in his neck.

"well, this fucking sucks!" Brown yelled, pulling out his Desert Eagle. As the zombie fell, John, out the corner of his eye, quickly spotted Miranda, Arbiter, Shepherd, Foley, and Dunn leave the mess hall.

"where are you going?" John yelled, beating a zombie in the head, killing it instantly.

"we're gonna try and spread the zombies apart, see if we can't push 'em out that way!" Shepherd yelled.

"try and come back in one piece!" John replied, aiming his assault rifle at a zombie. The zombie fell to the ground dead. But another one took his place and attempted to make a snack out of the super-soldier. It just seemed that no matter how many zombies died, more would take their place. They all began to wonder what planet did they land on to have this many zombies. In the hallways, the aforementioned characters that left the mess hall blasted zombies that just seemed to pop out all over the place, through the windows, from the ceilings and floors, the bulkheads, they were all over the place.

"how the hell did these things get in? And what happened to all the Marines?" Miranda yelled.

"I don't know, keep shooting!" Shepherd yelled. The small group ran throughout the maze of hallways and corridors of the _Morning Sun_, doing what they could to draw the zombies away from the mess hall. Problem was, it took forever to do so. 10 hours, to be precise. So they actually had no idea if the rest of the team was still alive.

"what do we do, Commander?" Shepherd asked, firing his M4 rifle.

"I don't know, General, I honestly don't know." a tired Miranda Keyes sighed.

"we should head back to the mess hall, help our comrades defeat this new foe." the Arbiter said, slashing a zombie with his energy sword.

"how are we gonna get there, the only way back is packed with zombies." Foley growled, reloading his SCAR-H rifle.

"there's a teleporter in the mess hall, I overheard Richtofen and Brown talk about them, something about matter transportation. Just think of the teleporters from _Star Trek_, they essentially do the same thing. All we need to do is find one." Dunn said.

"alright. There's a teleporter in the main armory, let's get there." Foley said. They quickly ran to the main armory, stocked up on more ammo and weapons, hooked up the teleporter to the one in the mess hall, and pressed the button.

"oh my god….." Foley sighed when he saw the destruction. Zombies were _everywhere_. Somehow, they managed to get in through the ceiling via the plumbing system, and dropped down in the unsuspecting soldiers. It was clear that they were fighting to the last breath, all the weapons that were on the walls were now gone, lying on the floor, discarded and empty of ammo. They were no reduced to using either side arms or DG weapons. But that wasn't enough, it wasn't nearly enough.

"keep shooting, we gotta hold 'em off!" John screamed, holding a DG-2 rifle.

"we're almost outta ammo, we can't hold 'em forever!" Ghost, Miller, and Emile screamed at the same time.

"Makarov, got any hidden plans up your sleeve?" Carter yelled toward the former Russian terrorist.

"let's see how they like this!" he screamed. He pulled out a detonator and hit the switch. The result was that the walls and door entrances seemed to explode, taking many zombies down. But it wasn't enough.

"hey Richtofen, Brown, you guys got anything else, we're all outta tricks!" John screamed.

"we put something up that might work, but we're gonna need Cortana to actually use it!" Brown yelled, firing his MP5K.

"why Cortana?"

"because she's the one that suggested it!" Richtofen yelled.

"Cortana, is it true?"  
>"I got something at the bridge that can help us out, but it's a one-time shot, we can't afford to miss it."<br>"no, there's gotta be another way."  
>"Chief, you're almost outta ammo, the zombies are constantly pouring in, we don't have a choice."<p>

Very reluctantly, John removed the data chip from his helmet. Grabbing Richtofen and Brown harshly,

"you bring her back to me in one piece. Don't fail me, the result would be rather gory." John harshly growled towards the two scientists. The two took off toward the main bridge while everyone else continued to shoot into the oncoming horde.

"where are they going?" Kat yelled.

"something about defenses to destroy the zombies, but they better hurry up!" John yelled, swinging his left arm, using his chain saw to decapitate a zombie. That didn't stop them, though. In the bridge, Richtofen and Brown were busy trying to handle two tasks at the same time: keep the zombies out while getting Cortana's 'solution' ready.

"I can't do both at the same time! Brown, you know this system better then I do! Gimme your gun, I'll hold 'em off!" Richtofen yelled. He was now duel-wielding an MP-40 and an MP5K, laughing like a maniac.

"something's wrong with him, I just don't know what it is." Cortana said.

"no one knows what's wrong with him." Brown muttered. The zombies continued to pour, however, and the team in the mess hall were slowly being pushed back. As in, they were slowly being overwhelmed by the overwhelming horde of undead. They didn't know about the rest of the crew, whether they were alive or turned into zombies. At that moment, however, they didn't care; all they wanted was to stay alive. Unfortunately, it then took a turn for the worse; the zombies had now successfully penetrated the bridge.

"CORTANA! BROWN! HIT THE SWITCH, NOW!" Richtofen frantically screamed. Brown hit a button on the computer console. Massive waves of electricity burst from the _UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun_, effectively destroying all the zombies on the planet.

"is that it? Is it over?" Miller asked, clutching his M6D Magnum tightly.

"it's over. It's finally fucking over." Dempsey sighed. Then they heard the sound of static electricity. Everyone looked over to the teleporter on the far side. There was an electric ball of some sort.

"uhgh, those don't sound like freak bags." Dempsey growled. Suddenly, hordes of dogs emerged, with fire all over their outer fur complete with yellow eyes.

"SON OF A BITCH!" Nikolai screamed as the hellhounds began swarming throughout the mess hall. John picked up a fallen AT4 rocket launcher and fired it into the teleporter. The round hit the inner chamber and destroyed the electric ball. Once all the hellhounds were dead,

"okay, _now_ it's over." Dempsey sighed. Everyone then collapsed on the ground due to massive exhaustion. The team of soldiers and officers had never fought like that in their entire lives. Not even John or the Arbiter fought like that against the Flood. After 5 hours of sleep, everyone woke up to see blood, body parts, bullet and shotgun shells, and discarded weapons all over the floor.

"how'd they get in?" Dunn asked.

"I don't know. I honestly don't know." Takeo said.

"the repair and clean up will take a while. But I wanna know how the zombies came into being." John stated. So the investigation was put in place. They found that Element 115, even though it was very helpful, came with a rather bad downside: it could bring the dead back to life with the right amount. When Richtofen discharged the second Wunderwaffe Cannon to release the 115, he let loose so much 115 that every dead being on the planet came to life. They were immediately drawn to the largest source of 115: the _UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun_. upon further inspection, they found that the zombies successfully attacked en masse because the ship's defenses were never activated. They also found that all the windows and outer hatches were left wide open, allowing the hordes to simply walk in. the marines that were tasked with guarding the ship were taken completely off guard, and because they never fought zombies before, they didn't know what to do, which resulted in almost all of them being turned into a zombie happy meal. Now their crew, which started at almost 200,000 souls, was brought down to just 125. The zombies were rather smart, not smart enough to grab a gun and use it, but smart enough to use the plumbing system to breach through the ceiling of the mess hall. Cleaning the ship took forever. And not wanting to risk more zombies attack them, it had to be done above the planet's surface in space. In zero-G. so all the weapons were returned to their original slots on all the walls and ceilings, Noble Team and John's old armor were put into storage for later use, basically, anything that could be strapped down was tied down. Then they opened all the windows and hatches and a massive decompression happened, sweeping everything out the ship. After resealing and re-pressuring the ship, repairs were made, mostly to the top of the ship were the zombies were able to break through. But perhaps the biggest, and most shocking realization came when they found what planet they landed on: Sargon II, one of the farthest human colonies from Earth. It was reported that when the Covenant destroyed it, billions of human lives were lost. That was why there was a seemingly endless horde of zombies attacking the supercarrier. Damn good thing Cortana, Brown, and Richtofen installed….whatever it was that destroyed the zombies.

"I hope we never have to fight those maggot sacks ever again." Dempsey said. Everyone agreed with him on that part. Less then one week later, Richtofen and Brown were busy creating something, more then likely contained 115.

"so what are guys building now, a nuclear bomb that's controlled by 115?" Makarov joked.

"nope. Richtofen here told me about something called Perk-a-Cola, is that right?"  
>"yup. Basically, they're enhancements made to greatly enhance the drinker in many different ways. We already finished them, we're just making more of them." on a small shelf above the two scientists sat several bottles and cans.<p>

"what's this one?" Makarov asked.

"Juggernog. It increases the physical density of your body so it makes it harder for someone to kill you."

"and this one?" the Russian asked, picking up a green bottle.

"Speed Cola. Increases your movements by 42%. Imagine if a SPARTAN in full MJOLNIR armor drank that." Brown chuckled. Putting the bottle down, Makarov grabbed another one.

"and this?"  
>"Quick Revive. It's supposed to help revive someone near death, so it's only to be used by medics. But it has a fishy taste to it." Makarov took a sip of it.<p>

"AAGH! I HATE THE TASTE OF FISH!"

"everyone does. The next one is Double Tap Root Beer. Increases your rate of fire, but it only works with semi-automatic weapons. You know, anything that doesn't fire more then one bullet when fired."  
>"huh."<p>

"the next soda is Stamin-Up, increases your stamina level. Should come handy in a fight."  
>"and they're all powered by 115?"<br>"in case you haven't noticed, 115 powers everything on this ship." Brown said, mixing some chemicals together.

"okay then." the Russian then left the room.

"oh, and tell everyone that the main teleporter in the mess hall has been brought off line, no one can use it." Brown said. Richtofen paused for a moment when Brown said that. He continued his work, but he had already began working on something else in his head. Five hours later,

Everyone was in the mess hall chatting about the zombie incident. For some reason, Richtofen, Dempsey, Takeo and Nikolai weren't there.

"I still can't believe how those zombies came in like that, they were just all over the place." Mickey said.

"oh come on, Mickey, those guys didn't have crap on us." Jorge replied.

"YES! WE DONE IT!" a loud voice came. Dempsey, Nikolai, Richtofen, and Takeo came running into the mess hall, cheering like happy maniacs. Which they were. For some reason, everyone else began cheering as well.

"WE DID IT, MY FRIENDS! WE COMBINED ALL THE PERK-A-COLA'S INTO ONE SUPER-DRINK! WE'LL JUMP THROUGH THE PORTAL AND COME OUT NEW MEN!" Richtofen yelled loudly.

"are you sure it'll work?" Dare laughed.

"OF COURSE IT'LL WORK!" Takeo yelled.

"it's not gonna work, guys." Kat smirked.

"oh, and why's that?" Nikolai said, wanting to hear the SPARTAN's opinion.

"John had that teleporter disconnected from the rest. You jump inside and fire it up, something bad is gonna happen to you."

"so?" Takeo replied.  
>Kat rolled her eyes, she couldn't believe the stubbornness and stupidity of these soldiers.<p>

"so, John's not gonna be proven wrong by something as incredibly stupid as combining all the perk-a-cola's into one drink."

"well that's why it's gonna work." Richtofen said.

"because it's so incredibly stupid." Dempsey said. The four soldiers stood up, their soda's in hand.

"alright people, BOTTOM'S UP!" Takeo said. The four soldiers downed their soda's and jumped into the teleporter.

"YES!" they cried, knowing that they weren't dead. The activated the teleporter, which began humming.

"YES!" their plan worked.

"SEE YOU ON THE OTHER SIDE!" Dempsey shouted with glee. Light filled the chamber of the teleporter, so bright that the four soldiers couldn't be seen. Suddenly, lighting bolts began shooting out of the device, and instantly, the four soldiers were thrown right out, landing on the floor, groaning in pain.

"okay, that probably wasn't my best idea." Richtofen groaned. John walked in, a smirk on his face.

"I told you guys not to activate the teleporter." John smirked.

"fuck you." Nikolai groaned, although he wasn't in the mood to pick a fight with a SPARTAN. John just shook his head.

"I want this teleporter kept off line at all times, until Richtofen and Brown fix it." John ordered, pointing to the teleporter that the four soldiers tried to go through.

"why are you so hyped up about this certain teleporter, Chief, it's the same as all the others." Carter said.

"yeah, what's the big deal?" Johnson asked.

"remember when those hellhounds came through?" John reminded everyone. No one knew how they came in, or even where they came from. Richtofen, Brown, and Cortana had run countless diagnostics on the teleporters, and couldn't find anything on how the hellhounds got in.

"do you want that to happen again?"

No one contradicted him on that.

"I just want to know one thing. Where did those hell-hounds come from?" John asked as he stared at the teleporter.

2 months later…..

August 30th, 2553

_UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun_

Two months had passed, and no one had a clue as to where the hell-hounds came from. Nevertheless, all the teleporters were temporarily brought off-line, and were then re-hooked into the main system and brought back on line. Dempsey, Richtofen, Nikolai and Takeo tried their previous stunt again, but the same thing happened. After that, they decided not to attempt going through the teleporter again, unless the situation demanded it. However, something worse then the zombies came up.

"we're running low on fuel." Brown said.

"yeah right, how can we be running outta gas?" Dempsey said, not believing the scientist.

"when we released the energy hidden in the second cannon, apparently, it was enough to vaporize almost all of our fuel. We're down to our reserves only."

"so what does this ship run on?" Kat asked.

"originally, it ran on a fossil fuel called Unobtainium. Don't ask me why, blame the main reactor. But when we put the 115 on the ship, both those materials merged together. But because of that blast, we barely have enough fuel to last this ship for 1 month, and that doesn't include the teleporters, vehicles, and the Wunderwaffe cannons. So we're gonna have to find new sources of fuel."

"what about the 115?"  
>"the 115 only supports the Unobtainium. It doesn't replace it. 115 doesn't have the power to run this whole ship. In a nutshell, we need that Unobtainium. Period."<p>

"so where are we gonna get it?" Richtofen asked.

"Cortana and I recently found a large planet that is practically overflowing with Unobtainium. We call it XF-821, we don't have an official name for it. I'll be sending two officers to the planet to confirm that Unobtainium is actually there."

"who goes?" Kat and Carter asked simultaneously.

"guess." John said, looking at the two SPARTAN's.

"why us?" Carter asked.

"your blue armor makes it perfect for this mission. The probes that we sent confirm that the planet has a very unnatural blue look to the ground, so if there are any natives here, you guys won't be spotted. And if there are, I'm pretty sure you two will handle 'em." Cortana said. Carter and Kat didn't like it. But they had their orders. Everyone was dismissed from the staff room, the two SPARTAN's headed down to the hanger deck where their Pelican was readied. They saw Nikolai crawl out from underneath the Pelican covered in grease. Now they knew where he was during the meeting.

"well, she's all prepped and ready to go. I added extra weapons, you wanna go over 'em?" the Russian pilot said eagerly.

"what do we got?" Carter asked.

"I put two extra M41 LAAG's on the wings, three .50 cal machine guns on the nose, two .20 MM cannons on the nose, extra rockets on the wings, and I increased the space on the bottom to hold a bunker-buster bomb."

The two SPARTAN's raised their eyebrows, this was definitely above-average armament for a Pelican dropship.

"I got more. I jacked up the engines on this bird so you can fly faster then an average Pelican. I also increased the rotary clutch system so you can turn faster then you normally would in a standard Pelican. And the Arbiter gave me a little present. I put energy shielding on this thing, so it can take up to 15 hits from a Phantom's main cannon. Just be careful not to let the generator get destroyed, we only have one of those." the Russian said, wiping his greasy hands on a washcloth.

"so, what do you think?" he asked. The two SPARTAN's looked at their Pelican with awe. They never knew that Nikolai could do such a thing to any flying aircraft.

"you are a miracle worker with flying aircraft, you know that?" Kat smirked.

"I try my best." the Russian said. But you could definitely tell what Kat said was a boost to his ego. The two SPARTAN's climbed inside the Pelican as surveying equipment was loaded. The two found out that most of the equipment would be controlled from the _Morning Sun_, from the bridge. All they had to do was make sure that no one destroy the equipment.

"Pelican 183, this is _UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun_. Good luck and Godspeed." John said.

"copy that, _Morning Sun_, we'll be back." Carter said as the Pelican left the supercarrier's hanger bay and shot off towards the planet below. Back on the ship,

"so the plan is they get to the planet, activate the equipment, scan the planet and see if we got enough fuel for us, and if it's a yes, we haul a bunch of equipment down there and harvest it?" Miller asked Dr. Brown, cleaning his BR55 rifle.

"that's the plan, private." the doctor said.

"huh. Hope nothing goes wrong then." the American soldier said, scratching the back of his neck. As Pelican 183 headed down to the planet surface,

"I still don't know why they chose us for this mission. Seems more like a waste of our abilities as SPARTAN's." Carter said.

"maybe it is, but I just got some rather juicy information on what we're really supposed to do." Kat said with a smirk as she pulled up a computer file on their real mission.

"how'd you do that?" Carter asked, impressed.

"I'm Kat." the female SPARTAN said rather proudly. Carter just stared at her. She would always find ways to impress him in ways that he never expected.

"so all we have to do is make some low passes above the surface, confirm that the fuel is here, report back to the ship, and harvest it and we're on our way?"

"that's the plan." Kat said with a smirk.

The plan, however, wasn't meant to be. When they got below the atmosphere, a rather wicked storm hit the Pelican and tossed it around like it was a toy. Alarms blared throughout the cockpit as Carter and Kat struggled to bring the ship back under control.

"damn that Russian, he lied to us!" Kat yelled through gritted teeth.

"he didn't lie, he just didn't know about the storm, no one did! Alright, I'm gonna put her down over there on that plateau!" Carter yelled. He pushed the stick down and to the left, but they felt rather gummy, the Pelican's engines weren't responded to his actions. It turned rather slowly. Suddenly, the ship dropped like a rock. Somehow, the engines had given out. Carter was still able to glide the Pelican to his designated LZ, but they both knew that it would be a rather harsh and rough landing. The nose slammed on the ground, causing the ship to initially fly upward. It then slammed back on the ground and skidded to a stop. There was no movement from the cockpit for a while. Carter eventually opened his eyes and groaned in pain. He looked down at his body and saw that his armor had a large amount of blood drooling down the front. He put his hand to his head and felt blood, a lot of it. _probably got a concussion_ he thought to himself as he got up from the pilot's seat. The cockpit was very, very damaged; the glass was gone and most of the flight controls had been smashed. He also noticed that he was out of his seat and slumped in the corner. He tried to stand up and felt a sharp pain in his left ribcage.

"hey Kat, you alright?" he slurred. He looked to his left and saw Kat slumped in the chair, not moving at all. Fear rose through the Commander as he grabbed the female SPARTAN and carried her out of the Pelican, ignoring his injuries. Some of the equipment was damaged in the crash, but that didn't matter, not to him. Opening the rear hatch, he climbed out of the Pelican and onto the light blue rock. Gently laying Kat on the ground, and hoping the worst hadn't come, he removed her armor and began CPR, desperately hoping that she wasn't dead. After about several minutes, Kat coughed up a small bit of blood. Carter could've have been any happier.

"thank god your alive!" he sighed as he pulled her into a tight hug. Kat returned the favor.

"how long have I been out?" she asked, slightly dazed.

"I don't know, couple hours I think. I'm gonna kill Nikolai when we get back." Carter said, causing the two to laugh lightly. The Pelican had taken far greater damage then he originally thought. The weapons were gone, that was for sure. The bunker-buster bomb on the bottom had been torn off in the storm, the guns on the nose had been scrapped away when it hit the plateau. The engines were a mess, they was no way they could've replaced them. If Carter didn't kill Nikolai first, then Nikolai was definitely gonna kill the two SPARTAN's when they got back.

"are you telling me that some freak storm brought down a heavily-modified Pelican with two of our SPARTAN's?" John asked.

"yes sir, the camera-hull images suggest that." Emile said.

"you planning a rescue op?" Cortana asked, her holographic form on top a holotank.

"I don't know. This ship's undermanned and I got two soldiers who need a rescue. If they're not dead, that is." John sighed. That's when the radar began bleeping.

"what's that?" Foley asked. Brown got up to check.

"aw shit. You're gonna have to scrap your rescue mission. We got 15 unidentified ships coming toward us. And they're coming fast."

"are they Covenant or Insurrectionist?" John asked.

"what makes you think they're not UNSC?" Shepherd asked.

"if they were UNSC, they would've hailed us by now. Something's not right." Miranda said, staring at the view screen with the tactical information. Dr. Brown, however, had already made his decision.

"all hands, this is your commanding officer. We are under attack by 15 unknown hostiles. I want all departments and battle stations ready for battle immediately. I understand that we are grossly undermanned, but we don't have a choice. Get to work, people." Brown said, speaking into the comm.

"Commander, I believe you're the ranking officer. The seat's yours." Brown said, taking the tactical station.

"are you serious, we can't fight off 15 ships with a Supercarrier manned by only 125 crewmembers." Bowman said.

"we can and we will, Petty Officer. Chief, take the squad and rally the Marines around the ship. If we get boarded, I need you to hold them off." Miranda said, taking the command chair.

"we'll be spread pretty thin." Jorge said.

"run fast, amigo." Castro said, tossing his cigar away and racking the bolt on his AK-47.

"Richtofen, I could use you on the ops station." Brown said, pointing at the chair next to him. The Nazi sighed, slinging his MP-40 behind his back and sat down. He would much rather be in the fight, to relish in all the blood that would spill, but practically no one else know how to run most of the ship's systems then Brown and him.

"weapon's status?" Miranda asked.

"Archer missile pods hot and ready. Both MAC guns are primed. I'll polarize the hull for extra protection, just to be safe." Brown said.

"do we know who the unknown forces are?" Miranda asked.

"IFF confirms, 4 UNSC light frigates, 3 UNSC light destroyers, 1 UNSC heavy-cruiser, and 7 luxury cruisers that look like they've been modified to carry Archer missiles. None of them are responding to my hails, and they're not ringing up in the log book. Definitely Innies." Brown rang out.

_Amateurs. These guys are nothing but Amateurs. But then again, we are seriously undermanned and underpowered at the moment. One undermanned and underpowered UNSC Supercarrier against 4 light frigates, 3 light destroyers, 1 heavy-cruiser and 7 make-shift gunboats. Assume that they're fully manned and they know what they're doing._ Miranda quickly thought. Almost immediately, she had a battle plan worked out.

"gimme full power to the engines. I want a MAC solution on the heavy cruiser. Both guns. If they're as accurate as I've read, see if you can't hit the bridge and their main gun at the same time." Miranda ordered.

"I got a lock, the system is primed."

"fire."

The large Supercarrier shuddered violently as two massive projectiles screamed out of the ship and slammed into the heavy cruiser. The lower round rammed into the MAC gun, flying down the barrel and impacting on the chambered round, causing a clog. The higher round smashed into the bridge and kept on going flying straight through the hull, destroying the engine room as well. The cruiser was out of the fight. But the rest of the ships now sped up and began to swarm the larger ship. The _Morning Sun_ was heavily armed and very powerful, but seriously undermanned and underpowered at the moment. Not to mention that even with the thrusters, it wasn't the most agile ship in space. And it definitely wasn't the fastest, despite the massive oversized engines in the rear.

"those light frigates are coming at us, very fast."

"helmsmen, take us to 445 by 331. Course correction 362 by 881. Full speed ahead. Dr. Brown, ready Archer missile pods A1 through E9. Fire on my command."

The massive warship soared upwards as her turrets fired at the enemy ships, peppering their hulls with anti-armor rounds. One of the luxury ships had it's reactor hit, causing it to go up in a mini-star. The explosion only singed the UNSC Supercarrier, but took down a light frigate, two light destroyers, and another luxury ship.

"are the pods ready?"  
>"yes ma'am."<p>

"fire!"

Missile after missile flew out and slammed into the remainder of the light frigates who were attempting to give a broadside.

"enemy light frigates destroyed." Brown announced.

"who do we have left?" Miranda asked.

"uh, we got one destroyer and 5 liners. Looks like their reforming, they're gonna try and hit us directly in the middle where our batteries are!" Brown yelled out.

"bring all our batteries to bear on those ships. Missiles, 50mm guns, I don't care what it takes to destroy those ships!" Miranda ordered. The top center of the _Morning Sun_ light up as armor-piercing rounds screamed through space and shredded the enemy ships.

"all enemy ships destroyed. No casualties on our part." Brown sighed. He just realized that he was sweating. Even though it was a small battle, it still took a bit of a small toll on him. He could only wonder what the battles against the Covenant would be like.

"Master Chief, enemy warships are destroyed. Did anyone board the ship?" Miranda asked.

"nope. So can we go get our missing SPARTAN's now?" John asked.

"we can't just hop in a Pelican and go down to the planet, we need to plan this out. We're grossly underpowered and undermanned, we can't take any risks at the moment." Miranda chided the eager SPARTAN.

"right. I'll assemble the squad in the war room, we'll plan the rescue op from there." John sighed.

* * *

><p>"so does everyone understand the mission?" John asked.<p>

Everyone understood. John would only be taking the SPARTAN's down to Reach. Dr Brown would also be going as well to check for any injuries the two missing SPARTAN's may have received as well as check to see if the planet did have the fuel they so desperately needed. Everyone else would have to stay onboard.

"Nikolai, I understand you have you have our Pelican ready. You modify it for our mission?" John asked.  
>"yes, sir, I did. I slapped extra weapons on it, 5 M134 mini-guns on the noses, three .30 cal MG's on the nose, ten .50 cal HMG's on the wings, grenade launchers, extra UV-32 rockets on the wings, chafes, flares, and small daisy-cutter packages on the bottom hull for bombing runs. Should give us an advantage in firepower against the local natives. We'll be carrying a Rocket 'Hog and a Mongoose that's been augmented with two MG-42 machine guns, one on the handle bars, the second is on the rear." the Russian said.<p>

"we execute Operation: DAISY-CUTTER tonight, 0900. Let's do this right and get our SPARTAN's home safely." John said. Down on the planet,

"nothing, nothing, and more nothing. Comm system took quite a hit when we hit the plateau. Nice piloting, by the way." Kat said sarcastically.

"hey, don't blame me, blame that freak storm we flew into." Carter defended.

"yes, the freak storm you piloted us into." Kat said with a smile on her face that Carter couldn't tell was either coy or that she wanted to hurt him. Badly.

"hey, why don't you blame Nikolai when we get back?"  
>"if we get back. Engines are dead, comm system is destroyed, we're stuck here, Commander." Kat said, leaning against the damaged nose that Carter couldn't help but find very attractive.<p>

"you can call me Carter, we're not exactly at HQ, Kat." Carter chuckled.

"why are you looking at me like that?" Kat asked.

"it's just…when I saw you unconscious in the cockpit, I was afraid the worst happened. God, you don't know how scared I was, Kat." Carter honestly said. Loud rumbling was heard, the two SPARTAN's looked up and saw storm clouds looming overhead. It began to rain almost immediately.

"aw, fuck." Kat said to herself as the two ran inside the Pelican, both of them laughed. The cargo bay was rather roomy, all the equipment had been blown out when the Pelican crashed.

"I'll take the first watch, you get some sleep." Carter said, grabbing his DMR.

"you need the sleep more than I do, Carter." Kat replied.

"I couldn't sleep if I had to listen to Jorge ramble on about self-colonial rule. Get some sleep, that's an order." Carter said.

"alright, you win." Kat smirked, removing her armor.

"something wrong with your leg?" the female SPARTAN asked. Carter was leaning against the wall, holding his left leg off the ground.

"aw, I think I may have twisted my kneecap when we crashed. I'm surprised you never noticed my limp."

"I did notice the limp, I just never bothered to tell you." Kat smirked. Carter just rolled his eyes.

"you sure you don't need any sleep, I can take first watch."

"Kat-"  
>"seriously, how long do you think you can stand like that?" Kat smirked. Carter knew she was right. He didn't want to admit it, but she was right. No use fighting on a useless leg.<p>

"alright, you win. You get first watch." Carter said, putting the rifle away and limping inside the craft. Slamming his body down on the ground next to Kat,

"you alright?" Kat asked.

"I'm fine. Hell, I should be more worried about you. When I saw you slumped over in the cockpit, god, I just freaked out. I kept praying that you weren't dead, that you were still alive. When you started breathing, well, that was the best feeling in my life, knowing you were still with me. You know, if anything bad were to happen to you, I don't know how I'd live without you." Carter said softly.

"I fell the same way about you, Carter." Kat replied. Carter then did something unexpected: he got closer and planted a kiss right on Kat's lips. Initially shocked, she got over it and brought him in closer. Pretty soon, the two were naked and fucking each other. As the storm got bigger and louder, high up in the skies above them was a heavily armed Pelican dropship.

"have you picked up the beacon yet?" John yelled into the comm.

"nothing yet!" Jun yelled.

"dammit, stick your nose in and find something. Anything that'll tell us if they're alive or not!" John yelled as he struggled to keep control of the Pelican.

"I'm trying, but the storm is playing hell with my thermo! It's no use, Chief, we can't find 'em from up here!" Jun yelled.

"alright, I'll bring us down closer." John said.

"we can't land there, the storm will tear the Pelican apart." Richard, Noble 6, reminded him.

"alright, we'll find a different spot. There, that looks good." John said, opening the throttle. When the Pelican landed at the designated LZ,

"hey, where's the Hog?" John asked. Apparently, the storm ripped the Warthog right off the mount. All they had left was the Mongoose.

"alright. Richard, Emile, take the Mongoose and go scout where their Pelican crashed. Make it fast." John ordered. The two SPARTAN's hopped on the ATV and rode off toward the Pelican.

"so are we just gonna wait here?" Jorge asked.

"nah, we'll walk."

"so if Emile and Richard come back and we're gone, what are they gonna do?"

"follow our footsteps." Doc Brown replied. Humping through the forest, however, was more taxing then they thought. It was early morning when they got to the crash site.

"Jun, you see anything?" John asked. The sniper was perched up in a tree, scanning the destroyed Pelican with his rifle.

"getting nothing on thermos. Either they're dead or Nikolai put something on that bird to block out their heat signatures."

"I'm hoping for the second one." John said. In the Pelican, the sun's rays caused the two naked SPARTAN's to wake up.

"how'd you sleep, my blue-eyed angel?" Carter asked mischievously.

"best sleep I've ever had in a long time, thanks to you. Ready for round two?" Kat asked with a wink. Carter could only comply with what she wanted. As the two soldiers started humping each other, back in the forest, Emile and Richard caught up with the rest of the SPARTAN's.

"you find 'em yet?" Richard whispered.

"okay, here's our situation, we don't know where Carter or Kat are, we can only assume that either they're dead or the natives took them, if this planet is inhabited. Alright, I want this tight, fast, and clean. Lock and load." John whispered. The sounds of guns cocking reverberated throughout the forest, catching the attention of the two lovers inside the Pelican.

"did you hear that?" Kat asked.

"yeah, and I don't like it." Carter muttered. They both got up and grabbed weapons, he was armed with an MA5B rifle while she grabbed a modified AIE-486H machine gun with a strap so she could fire it at the waist. The two SPARTAN's got in a covering position, ready to jump out and shoot their attackers. In the forest,

"on three. One… two…."

"we jump out on three. One….. Two….." Carter whispered. The two groups then jumped out at the same time and were aimed their guns at each other. And everyone was shocked. John and the rest of the SPARTAN's were shocked to see Carter and Kat stark naked. Carter and Kat were shocked because they never thought they would meet up with their squad like this. For over the next 3 hours, the most awkward and uncomfortable silence that ever plagued the team plagued them. Carter and Kat have never been so embarrassed in their lives. It was Dr. Brown that broke the silence.

"well, this is rather awkward." he said. Everyone slowly lowered their guns, very, very, slowly.

"okay. Um, the rescue pelican's are back there, way back there. So um, we'll just be waiting for you." John slowly said. The team then left the two naked soldiers standing there. Absolutely no one was gonna forget this moment. Ever. When they got back to the Pelican, they just sat there, waiting for the two SPARTAN's to arrive. When they did arrive,

"okay, I can assume that before you two starting humping each other, did you check the scanners to see if this planet has the fuel we need?" Brown asked.

"scanners are totally destroyed, flew out the Pelican when we crashed. But we managed to pick something on the I-T scanner before we hit, this planet is filled with unobtainium, just like we thought." Kat said.

"alright, we'll head back to the ship, bring down to the equipment, and grab the unobtainium." Brown said. The single Pelican took off from the planet surface and rocketed back to the _Morning Sun_.

"do we even have the equipment to harvest the unobtainium?" Viktor asked, cleaning his M4 rifle.

"in the main cargo bay, I stashed a bunch of construction equipment we can use to harvest the unobtainium. It's all fully automated, run by a computer program I installed when I first got them. We can set up a fully functional base complete with barracks, a mess hall, a CIC, the whole likes."

"do we have to put it up?" the Russian soldier asked, tinkering with a package of TNT. Brown became rather nervous. Makarov and his friends were the best in the team with explosives, better than Mickey. So whenever they played around with explosives, people became rather afraid.

"uh, no. it's full automated. Do you mind, with the TNT?" Brown asked.

"no." the Russian said, mindless that he was scaring Brown. Brown just sighed, there was no way he could get through to the Russian's head.

"so are we gonna get all the equipment down to the planet?" Makarov asked, drinking a glass of scotch. The _Morning Sun _positioned itself several miles above the planet's surface. Large bomb-bay like doors on the bottom opened up, and massive construction equipment and buildings were slowly lowered to the ground by a reverse-engineered Covenant gravity lift. Once they set foot on the ground, they immediately began working to harvest the material, and all the buildings immediately formed up.

"so how long will it take to gather the unobtainium?" Buck asked.

"for the amount I need, 5-6 months." Brown sighed.

February 22nd, 2554

_UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun_

6 months later, all the unobtainium was harvested. The planet would probably forever scarred because there was no natural material left, not to mention the team waged a small, genocidal war against the natives and drove them to near extinction, leaving less then 25 individuals alive.

"did you guys really have to drive these people to near extinction?" Brown asked.

"hey, they were messing around with our operations, and we need that unobtainium. So we took matters into our own hands." John said.

"yes, taking matters into your own hands means performing constant bombing runs on the native's villages." Cortana added sarcastically.

"hey, it's not my fault they didn't go through the industrial age when we showed up." John said. He acted like driving the local natives on the planet to near extinction was like going out and getting the daily mail.

"okay, we got all the fuel, engines are working perfectly, what do you wanna do now, Chief?" Brown asked.

"hey Dr. can I ask you something, why does everyone treat me like I'm their CO when Miranda and Carter are highest ranked officers onboard?"  
>"probably because you had the idea of traveling back in time to prevent the war from happening. They know you have to have big stones to pull that off. So they labeled you as the commanding officer of the Task Force 141."<p>

"so that's what we're calling the squad now?" John asked.

"MacTavish came up with the idea. They're all pretty psyched about going back in time, actually, and preventing the war from happening."

"I just wanna make one thing clear, Miranda can be the naval officer in charge, but if that's how things are gonna be, I'm gonna be the commanding officer for any ground operations."

"I'll spread the word around." Brown said, typing some items on his data pad.  
>"alright then. Fire up the flux capacitor and send us back. February 11th, 2525. Harvest, first contact with the Covenant."<p>

"alright, I'll start up the capacitor, you might as well tell everyone what the plan is."

"alright." John said, grabbing Cortana and putting her inside his head.

"hey John, wait, I need to tell you something."

"can you tell me later, Doc?" John asked as he walked outta the room.

"shit." the doctor muttered. Meanwhile,

"so, what's the plan?" Cortana asked.

"the plan is that we sneak up on the Covenant landing party and blast 'em using Wunderwaffe weaponry, should give us an advantage in firepower." John said.

"and if it doesn't work?"

"then we've become the instigators of the Human-Covenant War. And I do **not**want that to happen." John said rather forcefully.

"of course you don't want that to happen, you wouldn't want that on your conscience, would you?" Cortana joked.

"not really, no." John muttered. He went to the rifle range and found everyone firing random weapons into large steel cutouts of Covenant soldiers. Even the Arbiter was using a human weapon, an M60 machine gun with a grip made for a Sangheili, he was busy firing at a Elite Honor Guard.

"hey Thel, why are you using a human weapon firing at an Elite cut out?" John asked.

"for when we go back and prevent the war from happening. If it all goes south, I'm gonna need all the practice I can get with all battlefield weaponry."

"hmm. Well, I'm glad you're all getting the practice, because we're going to war in three hours. That's how long it takes to power up the time machine. We're going back to Harvest to stop the war. We'll be going with Wunderwaffe weaponry, should give us an advantage in firepower. So get ready, we'll be planet side in three hours."

"yes sir." MacTavish said, reloading his M4 assault rifle.

"oh, and one more thing. Did you guys just automatically label me as the commanding officer of the squad, and rename the squad as 'Task Force 141'?" John asked.

"yeah, we did." Price said, firing an M14 rifle.

"alright then. MacTavish, I'm promoting you to major, effective immediately. And it isn't because of you naming the squad one-four-one. It's because of what you did at that Insurrectionist station, how you managed to hold out so long with the rest of the guys on that moon, and how you came up with a plan to use napalm explosives against the local natives instead of standard rockets on the planet below us. I need a officer like that, and that person is you. Don't let it get to your head, however." John said before leaving the range. MacTavish just shrugged his shoulders and resumed firing his rifle, not giving the promotion a second thought.

Three hours later….

The Task Force 141 stood in the mess hall, all dressed and ready to kick some Covenant ass. Oddly enough, only the SPARTAN's and ODST's wore the new ODST and MJOLNIR armor John and Dr. Brown built. They all said that they felt more comfortable in their old uniforms. So they just wore what they were wearing when John originally picked them up outta the past. That didn't mean they weren't defenseless, John made those who didn't wear the new ODST armor wear a modified Kevlar vest underneath their armor that projected an energy shield. It was almost as powerful as the shield as the one on the ODST battle armor, but it was nowhere near powerful as the ones on the MJOLNIR armor. Still, it provided them with enough protection. Every single man and woman in the mess hall was armed with a DG Wunderwaffe weapon of their choice. Miranda Keyes, however, was up in the bridge, she wouldn't be taking part in the battle, John felt that if the Covenant knew that a high-ranked command officer was on the ground, she would be a number one target. Dr. Brown would also stay on the ship as well, seeing that the ship would need someone to run it, someone who was familiar with it's systems. Everyone else, however, would be on the ground. Here is the list:

Pvt. Charlie Miller-DG-4

Sgt. Frank Roebuck-DG-9

Cpl. Joe Polonsky-DG-9

Pvt. Chernov-DG-4

Pvt. Dimitri Petrenko-DG-4

Sgt. Viktor Reznov-DG-9

Dr. Edward Richtofen-DG-2

Pvt. Nikolai Belinkski-DG-3

Cpt. Takeo Masaki-DG-4

Pvt. Tank Dempsey-DG-4

Sgt. Frank Woods-DG-4

Cpt. Alex Mason-DG-2

Special Agent Grigori Weaver-DG-2

Special Agent Jason Hudson-DG-2

CPO. Joseph Bowman-DG-4

Pres. John F. Kennedy-DG-5

Prime Minister Fidel Castro-DG-5

Vice Pres. Richard M. Nixon-Duel-wield DG-1

Sec. Defense. Robert McNamara-DG-4

Gen. William Shepherd-DG-9

Pvt. James Ramirez-DG-9

Sgt. David Foley-DG-9

Cpl. Tyler Dunn-DG-9

Sgt. Gary 'Roach' Sanderson-DG-9

Mjr. John 'Soap' MacTavish-DG-9

Cpt. John Price-DG-7

Lt. Simon 'Ghost' Riley-DG-2

Marco 'Nikolai' Ramius-DG-2

Vladimir Makarov-DG-2

Viktor-duel wield DG-1

Anatoly-DG-7

Lev-DG-2

Kiril-DG-5

Commander Carter-A259-DG-2

Lt. Commander Catherine-B320-modified DG-1

Warrant Officer Emile-A239-DG-10

Warrant Officer Jun-DG-7

Chief Warrant Officer Jorge-052-DG-9

Lt. SPARTAN Richard-B312-DG-9

Cpt. Veronica Dare-DG-2

Gunnery Sgt. Edward Buck-DG-2

Cpl. Taylor H. 'Dutch' Miles-DG-5

Lance Corporal Kojo 'Romeo' Agu-DG-7

Lance Corporal Rookie-DG-4

Pvt. 1st-class Michael 'Mickey' Crespo-DG-5

Master Chief Petty Officer John-117-DG-2

Gunnery Sergeant Avery Junior Johnson-DG-9

Arbiter Thel 'Vaddem-DG-8

"alright guys, here's how it's all gonna go down. We land on the planet using cloaked Pelicans, sneak up on the Covenant who landed, and we blast 'em with everything we got. Hopefully, we'll get there before they meet with the UNSC officials and make the first contact."

"so the hope is the Covenant cruisers above us send a landing party after we kill the 'ambassadors' and pray they don't declare war on humanity?" Kat asked sarcastically.

"after we kill the landing party, we high-tail it back to the _Morning Sun_, and destroy the Covenant fleet."

"I wanna know one thing, what if this all goes south?" Shepherd asked, smoking his cigar.

"if it all goes south, then we'll just simply perform hit-and-run guerilla tactics against the Covenant behind enemy lines."

"so we're like a black ops squad?" Mason asked.

"basically."  
>"alright, let's get this done." Foley said. The time machine was activated and they left on their new mission.<p>

Harvest, Epsilon Indi System

February 11th, 2525

The supercarrier _Rise of the Morning Sun_ appeared above the planet Harvest, with the cloaking system on to prevent anyone seeing it. Several cloaked Pelicans roared to the planet's surface, their passengers ready for blood.

"Nikolai, you spotted the Covie landing party?" Eddie Buck asked.

"I see them, sergeant."

"this is for Sam." John growled, clutching his DG-2 rifle very tightly. The Pelicans continued toward the planet surface, decloaking when they got closer to the surface. When they landed and everyone got out,

"Harvest. Been a while since I've seen it unglassed." Johnson said, chewing on his cigar.

"let's get this over with." Shepherd said, lighting his cigar. They moved toward the general position of where the Covenant landing party would land. Unfortunately, they were too late; the first contact had already started.

"fuck, the meeting's already started!" Castro growled.

"hey Johnson, isn't that you?" Ghost asked.

"yeah, that is me." Johnson said. It was very weird for him to see his past self.

"alright guys, we shoot at the Covenant, and we do not stop until they're all dead." John said, cocking his DG-2 rifle.

"when do we start shooting?" Emile asked.

"on three."

"as in, 1-2-3, then start shooting, are do we start shooting immediately on three?" Kennedy asked.

"you know what, fuck it. I'll do it myself." John said, firing his rifle. Everyone else soon took suit. Unfortunately, all the gunfire caused dust to form a small cloud around them, blocking their vision.

"just keep shooting in the Covie's general direction!" Shepherd yelled. After about 3 hours of shooting, in which Emile had to switch his DG-10 with one of Nixon's DG-1 pistols because the kickback was too great. After about 24 minutes of constant shooting, the smoke and dust cleared away, revealing a couple dead humans and dozens of dead Covenant soldiers. Johnson managed to get away, however.

"why do I got a bad feeling about this?" John asked. They soon found out why. The dead Covenant soldiers rose up again. As zombies.

"oh, come on!" Bowman yelled. They had no choice but to use their DG weapons to fight the zombies. After they were dead, they quickly got back in their Pelicans and headed back to the _Morning Sun_.

"so, how'd it go?" Miranda and Brown asked.

"let's just say I have a bad feeling about this." John said. They quickly found out that the Covenant declared war on Humanity. John wasn't happy.

"HOW THE FUCK COULD THE COVENANT DECLARE WAR ON HUMANITY WHEN WE KILLED THE LANDING PARTY?" John screamed.

"simple, they sent down another landing party, found the dead bodies, and declared holy war." Ghost said, cracking open a can of beer.

"how the hell could that have happened?" John growled, clutching the table, almost crushing it with his augmented strength. He, Ghost, and Dr. Brown were in the mess hall.

"remember what I was trying to tell you before you promoted MacTavish?" Brown said.

"what?" John growled.

"I went back to my equations and formulas about time travel. Initially, I thought that you could change things in the past and affect the future. Turns out, I was wrong. Whatever happened, it happened. The war was gonna happen anyway, we never could've stopped it."

"WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME THIS WHEN I FIRST MET YOU?" John screamed angrily.

"because I thought we could change the future, just like you! But I kept on wondering if somehow I was wrong, so I went back and looked at my formulas and equations. I was dead wrong, you can't change the future. You can go back in time, that's for sure. But you can't change the future." Brown said. That's when John lost it.

"GOD-FUCKING-DAMMIT!" John screamed, grabbing the table and chucking it clear across the mess hall like it was nothing. The door busted open, revealing a semi naked Carter holding a B.A.R. a semi naked Kat was with him as well, holding a MA5B rifle.

"what was that?" they asked. John clutched another table, digging his fingers in the metal like it was clay.

"you two get dressed, and go get everyone for a meeting in the mess hall. Do it now." John said. The tone of his voice meant that he wasn't to be fooled around with. 2 minutes later, the 141 was in the mess hall. The rest of the crew were in the bridge.

"what's with the destroyed table?" Price asked.

"I'll tell you later. But I got bad news, really bad news." John said.

"what's the news?" MacTavish said.

"we prevented nothing, the war's still happening. Doc Brown just told me that we can't change anything in the past to affect the future."

"so what do we do now?" Weaver asked.

"do what any sane man will do. Prepare for 30 years of pure hell." John said, sighing in defeat. That wasn't reassuring. Not at all.

"Brown, what weapons do we have on this ship?"  
>"last I checked, 2 regular MAC cannons, 2 Wunderwaffe Cannons, 1,900 oversized Archer missiles, 850,000 50mm point defense guns, 50 nuclear weapons, 2,500 ATAF missile turrets, and courtesy to Group 851, 45,500,000 40 cm45 Type 94 naval guns. The ones used on the Japanese battleship _Yamato_ during World War II. And they were converted to small MAC guns by augmenting the inner barrels." Brown said.

"defensive barriers?"  
>"five layers of Titanium-A triple armor which can be polarized for added protection, and the energy shielding Thel gave us, three layers of it."<p>

"alright, let's get outta here."

"so, what's the plan against the Covenant?"

"despite what the ship's packed with, it would be suicide to go up against the Covenant Navy alone. We'll be performing guerilla tactics against their fleet, Black Ops missions." John said.

"one more thing. How'd the dead Covies come back to life as zombies?" Hudson asked.

"I can only theorize that the amount of 115 radiation from our weapons was what brought 'em back to life." Brown sighed.

"alright then, new order. No one uses DG-based weaponry unless it's absolutely necessary. Same thing goes for the Wunderwaffe Cannons, I don't want a Covenant cruiser being controlled by zombies."

"yes sir."

"alright, get the ship outta here." John sighed. They decided they would attack the Covenant immediately, so they chose to attack a Covenant supply line labeled 'Supply Line: D86541" where they would hide in position, and when the Covenant ships appear, they would come out of hiding and attack the ships. The plan was soon put into effect.

February 12th, 2525

_UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun_

Supply Line-D86541

The UNSC supercarrier lay in wait with the cloaking device on.

"any minute, the supply fleet should appear on the scanner." Brown muttered.

"alright, I'll bring the weapons online." Richtofen said, activating the ship's numerous weapons stationed all around the hull. The Covenant ships then appeared.

"drop the cloak, launch the fighters and start shooting!" Brown yelled. Booster Frames, a modified F-15 Eagle fighter jet, and several heavily armed Pelicans shot out of the supercarrier and engaged the Covenant Seraphs and Space-Banshees. Ramius was flying the F-15 jet.

"here they come, let's take 'em!" Ramius yelled, launching several missiles. The Seraphs fired their lasers, but the Pelicans and Booster Frames were too fast. The _Morning Sun _aimed her numerous weapons at the Covenant fleet and unleashed hell. The nearest ship targeted, a Covenant frigate, was almost immediately destroyed.

"target the capital warships, don't worry about the smaller vessels." Miranda said, she was in the bridge as well. She was considered too valuable to be used in combat because she was a command officer, whereas John was a SPARTAN so he could be in the field and still command the task force. As a Covenant CCS-class battle cruiser fell four MAC rounds fired from the _Morning Sun_,

"Noble Team, you're on me! We're gonna take that Corvette and use it against the Covies!" John ordered.

"a lot easier said then done, commander, that damn thing's covered in Banshees!" Jun yelled. Although John hated to admit, Jun was right, there was no way they could punch their way into the Corvette.

"let's just destroy the Corvette and focus on those fighters, there are biggest threat right now!" Ramius yelled, firing his plasma cannons into a Banshee.

"right. Take care of those fighters, then we'll destroy the warships!" John angrily yelled. As the Covenant Seraphs soon found themselves being shot to pieces, a Covenant carrier charged head-on against the UNSC Supercarrier.

"Richtofen, launch two nukes with 'dummy' warheads, when they're in range, pull the trigger."

The result, two large nuclear explosions that brought the carriers' shields down to non-existent. The carrier was soon finished off with MAC rounds.

"sir, I'm reading new contacts!" Kat yelled. It was a large fleet of UNSC frigates being used by the Insurrectionists.

"how many frigates do they have?" Mason yelled.

"I'm reading 25 frigates!" Cortana replied.

Over the radio,

"….UNSC warship, this is the frigate _Mt. Rushmore_, do you need assistance?"

"we'd appreciate it, target the Covenant cruisers on our left flank!" Brown yelled over the comm. The frigates launched missiles and MAC rounds against the Covenant fleet, thinning out the Covenant numbers. After 70 minutes of seemingly endless fighting, the last Covenant warship, a Corvette trying to escape, was destroyed.

"frigate _Mt. Rushmore_, I'd like to speak to you on my ship, personally. Send your captain onboard." John said as he piloted the Booster Frame back onto the supercarrier. Once he was onboard, he dismounted the frame and headed to the main airlock where the Insurrectionist captain awaited him.

"oh my god, what are you?" he asked once he saw the 7-foot tall SPARTAN.

"it's none of your business, I wanna talk to you about serving on this ship, we could use the extra manpower."

"uh, John, we don't need the extra manpower, ship's run by computers." Brown said.

"and what happens when your computers go down, there's barely enough men and women onboard this ship to run a frigate." John said.

"alright, they can come onboard. Let's destroy the frigates, we don't need 'em." Brown said.

"how 'bout we scavenge the frigates for extra food, weapons, ammunition, fuel, we could really use that stuff." MacTavish said, lighting a cigar.

"alright then, we'll take what we need." Brown said. By the end, most of the frigates had been totally taken apart, electronics were to be used for backups, sublight and FTL engines were put in storage, the frames and outer and inner plating of the frigates themselves were used as extra bulkheads and additional armor for the super carrier. Now the supercarrier was running at 92% capacity. Not what they were hoping for, but it was definitely a massive boost in terms of man power. The carrier soon left the system, going on another killing spree against the Covenant.

November 13th, 2528

Uncharted territory, believed to be Covenant space

_UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun_

"It's been 3 years since the start of the war. We've been fighting the Covenant behind enemy lines using guerilla-style tactics, but it doesn't seem to have any effect on their war machine. We've been launching attacks against shipyards, construction facilities, mining fleets, anything that could slow them down, we've destroyed them. Whenever we set foot on a planet, Covenant troops always mass in the thousands. And yet, we've always won. But this isn't going the way how I planned it at all, maybe it's time we should use….. Unconventional solutions to win this war." John muttered to himself, putting in his daily log as the commander of the 141. He began looking in the database for anything he could use to win the war. Unfortunately, he didn't find a whole lot. As he continued his search, and praying that Cortana wouldn't find out, in one of the dozens of large laboratories, Dr. Brown, Richtofen, and Dutch were in one of the laboratories with several frozen corpses and a large teleporter that they built and hooked up to the system.

"alright, let's try it again." Brown muttered. He turned a recorder on, and spoke into it.

"UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun, the date is November 13, 2528. Dr. Emmett Brown recording. My associate, Dr. Edward Richtofen and I are currently starting the 15th test. Subject, being the now dead Jonathan Antilles, is inside the testing chamber, the door is shut, we are activating power." Brown said. One of the corpses was placed inside the teleporter, which was rigged with a chain-link door to prevent anyone from escaping. Richtofen hit the switch, and the teleporter came to life. The result was that the body was vaporized, leaving behind a small pool of blood.

"ah great, not again." Richtofen muttered.

"alright, put another one in, Dutch." Brown said.

"do you guys really believe this is necessary, I mean, we can't exactly play God with these dead guys. I just doesn't feel right." the veteran ODST grumbled.

"it's just an experiment, Dutch, we have nothing to worry about. Test number 16 is a-go. Subject is in chamber, activate power." Richtofen said. The same thing happened, but this time, the corpse wasn't destroyed. Instead, it rose up with life in it's eyes. A zombie. Dutch readied his Desert Eagle.

"hey, you, stand up!" Richtofen said, opening the door. The zombie immediately ran out, screaming and yelling. He received a bullet in his head, killing it instantly.

"test subject for test 16 is a failure. All previous subjects have either been reduced to pools of blood, or have been brought back to life as zombies by element 115, but they have been reduced to, mentally that is, pre-caveman beings with a lust for blood and flesh. They don't seem to recognize what actions they're doing, and they can't seem to understand to use, well, anything. Tools, weapons, they only use their hands. They're zombies, all right, in the classic zombie routine of moving forward with their arms stretched out, although some subjects have shown to move with an almost militaristic manner, such as ducking and running with their heads down. We will cancel the remaining tests, and vaporize the corpses so as that we will not have a zombie epidemic on our hands onboard the ship. This is Dr. Edward Richtofen, saying thank you for listening, and have a nice day. Or night, whatever the time may be when you're listing to this." Richtofen said, causing Dutch to chuckle lightly. Back in John's quarters, Cortana appeared on the holo-display.

"whatcha looking at?" she asked.

"anything I can use to end this war more quickly. God, I still can't believe the war is happening, I just can't believe it." John muttered.

"mind if I ask you a question?" Cortana asked.

"shoot."

"why'd you go back and get Noble Team, instead of Blue team?"

"trust me when I say that that was probably the hardest decision I ever made. I so wanted to go back and get Blue Team, but I realized that if I was gonna make this work, I needed a team who was just as good as Blue Team, but I didn't know a thing about them, combat wise. If I chose Blue Team, then this whole mission might've not worked. I don't know a whole lot about how Noble works in the field. I wanted to get familiar with them, so I could incorporate new tactics on the ground, make me a better soldier. I should probably hit the hay, I'm gonna need the rest for, well, the next 27 years." John chuckled. Cortana left the Chief's quarters while John removed his armor and collapsed on the bed, dead tired. He had plenty to do for a long time to come. But as he fell asleep, a nagging thought lingered in the back of his mind, could he build something that could help end the war faster, maybe with that new element they brought onboard, Element 115?

November 14, 2528

_UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun_

Unknown System

Unknown Planet

The lone human supercarrier activated the slipstream drive and left it's previous position. They then appeared above a large ice planet. With several Covenant light cruisers glassing the planet.

"are there Covenant troops on the surface?" Miranda asked.

"yup, we got movement on the surface." Brown said.

"alright, everyone get to the Pelicans, we're taking the fight to the surface. Miranda, you and Brown stay on the ship. Destroy as many of those cruisers as you can, and try and keep the Pelican's from being shot down on our way to the surface." John said. The Pelicans landed on the planet without getting hit as the supercarrier made mincemeat out of the light cruisers. When the 141 got down on the planet, they immediately began slaughtering Covenant troops.

"hey John, I'm reading a large Covenant structure up a head, looks like a base of sorts. I'm sending down some Rocket 'Hog's to help you take it." Miranda said.

"copy that, did you say we were taking the base?" John asked.

"yes, I did."

"copy that. Alright people, listen up! Command wants us to take a Covenant base! They're sending down some 'Hogs we can use to take it!" John yelled. The Warthogs arrived, and the attack was on. The Covenant sent defenses of their own: Ghosts, Banshees, and Wraith tanks. They were soundly destroyed by the Warthogs, who had air support as well from Nikolai who was flying a Longsword bomber.

"alright, we're taking that base right now!" John yelled, gunning the lead warthog. Nikolai fired off a round of rockets that blew the front gate open, allowing the warthogs to plow in. once they were inside, the soldiers hopped out and quickly began killing off all the Covenant troops inside.

"over here, there's one over here!" MacTavish yelled.

"all snipers, get up to the top, we're gonna need covering fire!" Carter yelled. The snipers quickly got to the highest point they could find and began sniping Covenant troops like there was no tomorrow. As the troops began assaulting deeper and deeper into the base, a massive explosion rocked the ground, temporarily halting the battle.

"what the hell was that?" Mason yelled. Mason, Weaver, and Makarov ran outside to see a Covenant Scarab walking towards them.

"shit, we got a Scarab!" Weaver yelled, running back into the base. Nikolai flew his Longsword over and fired off a barrage of rockets and missiles at the Scarab, but to very little affect.

"I got this." John grumbled.

"what are you doing?" Cortana asked as the super soldier ran towards the Scarab, narrowly dodging a large beam of plasma aimed at his body. He got onboard, found the power source, and planted several grenades behind the main shield. He quickly jumped off as the Scarab blew to pieces.

"that's how you destroy a Scarab!" the SPARTAN yelled rather proudly.

"show off." Mason muttered, reloading his M-16.

"alright guys, let's keep moving, I wanna kill me some freak sacks." Dempsey growled, firing his B.A.R into a retreating Grunt. They got back in their Warthogs and gave chase to the retreating Covenant soldiers. The result was a slaughter.

"hey, I'm reading a city, it's rather large! It's about 15 kilometers in our current direction!" Foley yelled into his comm unit.

"okay, let's head over there, rescue as many civilians as we can! _Morning Sun_, this is Hudson! We're going to a large city to rescue civilians and clear it of any Covenant activity!" Hudson yelled.

"good hunting." Miranda replied.

"it's a-go!" the former CIA agent yelled. The Warthogs continued towards the city. They saw massive columns of black smoke sticking out of the skyline. That wasn't a good sign.

"think we'll find any civvies, Sarge?" Dunn asked.

"honestly, I don't think so." Foley replied. Once they got inside the city, they found nothing but destroyed buildings and dead human soldiers and civilians alike. The Covenant spared no one.

"_Morning Sun_, this is Sierra two-five-nine, there aren't any humans we can rescue. They're dead, they're all dead." Carter solemnly reported.

"copy that, I'll send some Pelicans to pick you up." Miranda replied. The Task Force one-four-one were rather surprised to see so many dead humans. They were all visibly disturbed by that sight.

"I gotta create something that can end this war quickly; I don't think I can handle any more human deaths." John whispered to himself.

Suddenly, a Brute Chieftain appeared behind the Chief and swing his gravity hammer, catching the SPARTAN before he could react. He was hit in the ribs, hard, and was flung away like he was a rag doll. The Brute was soon gunned down by the rest of the squad.

"Chief! Chief! John, get up!" Cortana yelled into John's ears. John moaned in pain as he slowly awoke.

"uh, what hit me?" he muttered.

"a Chieftain swung his sledgehammer and nearly cut you in two. We got the bastard, though." Dempsey said, grabbing the SPARTAN and lifting him up. He got a loud, ear-piercing scream from the soldier instead.

"what the fuck, what's wrong with you?" Dempsey yelled. John gingerly touched his left rib cage and screamed in pain again.

"his ribcage is broken." Takeo said.

"we gotta get him back to the ship, now." Woods sighed. Moving a one-ton super soldier who had his ribcage broken was not an easy task, however.

"how the hell are we gonna move him, he's in no condition to move." Kennedy sighed. They resorted to using the Morning Sun's reverse engineered gravity lift in the main hanger bay, lifting the SPARTAN up to the ship. John was then quickly rushed to the sickbay, where Doc Brown was preparing for surgery with the rest of the medical staff, most of which were Insurrectionists. Brown didn't trust them, but they were all he had.

"alright, we gotta get the armor off, put some morpha in him, a lot." Brown ordered. After the morpha was injected, John felt himself falling asleep. After hours of operating on the wounded SPARTAN, John woke up. Almost immediately, he touched his face. He was growing a small stubble.

"how long was I out?" he asked himself.

"two whole days, Chief." Brown said, walking in the sickbay with his bio-charts.

"what happened to me?" John inquired.

"well, when that Chieftain hit you, he managed to break your ribcage."

"come again?"  
>"he broke your ribcage. Hell, it was more extensive than that. Your ribs were crushed, your left was pierced to shit, and, as God is my witness, your heart has moved completely to your right cavity in your chest. We had to clone your lungs and rebuild your heart. We also rebuilt your ribcage as well; mechanical implants that expand to allow you to take in more air when you breath. Their almost indestructible."<p>

"you said you had to rebuild my heart. Care to explain?"  
>"in a nutshell, you heart is part organic, part mechanic. You can pump blood at a much faster rate now, depending on your stress level."<p>

"so your saying, I'm more of a cyborg now then I was before?"  
>"basically, that's what I'm saying."<p>

"what happened to my armor?"  
>"we're fixing that up right now, you took quite a beating. If you were wearing your old armor, you'd be dead."<p>

John leaned back in the bed and contemplated what Brown said.

December 17th, 2528

Unknown planet, unknown system

_UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun_

Down in the hanger bay, Nikolai was busy fixing up the last of his newest creations.

"perfect, these will work just fine." the Russian sighed happily. He grabbed a rag and cleaned his greasy hands, taking in his new masterpiece. And John had just walked in.

"hey Chief." Ramius said.

"what's up, Ramius?"  
>"just working on what should be the next generation of attack aircraft. I'll explain. You know how the Pelicans can be modified to own a shitload of rockets and guns, but the soldiers inside don't actually get to shoot? And our attack helicopters don't hold a lot of weapons, but the soldiers get to shoot? Well, I decided to combine the best of both worlds and I came up with this." Ramius' newest creation was a regular pelican, but it looked vastly different. The wings were up much higher at a steep angle; the rear door was welded shut. The sides of the main fuselage was removed, making it look more like a helicopter then a transport. skids were added, not for take off and landing purposes, but so the Pelican could hold more weapons. The wings held around 15 rockets and AGM missiles, and two .20 mm cannons. On the nose was a .44 mm cannon, it packed a lethal punch. The skids held 2 M60's, 2 mini-guns, and one self-loading RPG-7 rocket launcher.<p>

"lot of firepower." John surmised; he wasn't sure if these Pelicans would even work. As if he was reading the SPARTAN's mind,

"I've already done the simulations, they work to their best performance." Ramius said.

"I believe you." John sighed. He could never get over how Ramius could turn a regular piece of metal into a fully functional killing machine.

"get these attack Pelicans ready, I'm going to the bridge." John ordered.

"sitrep." John said, walking in the bridge. Cortana appeared on the holo-projector.

"standard orbit achieved; I'm reading several UNSC destroyers engaged in several superior Covenant battle cruisers. And they're losing, no real surprise there."

"anything on the ground?" John asked.

"I'm picking up a rather panicked transmission."

"let's hear it." John said. On the speakers came several panicked transmissions of UNSC Marines being attacked by Covenant forces.

"let's get our equipment down there, see if we can't get a fixed position on this world." John asked.

"why here?" Cortana asked, they never had a fixed position until now.

"Shepherd thinks that this planet has good tubes for him to surf. Let's see if he's right." John said, pulling Cortana out of the main drive. Within hours, the Task Force 141, minus Brown, Keyes, and the Arbiter, went down with a bunch of Warthogs, the attack Pelicans, Hornets, Falcons, Longsword bombers, and Scorpions to support the faltering UNSC Marines. They also brought down a bunch of M9 Little Bird attack choppers for extra firepower. When they got down there, they found that the UNSC Marine base was nothing more then a small landing airstrip with anti-air flak turrets and Scorpion tanks doubling as anti-air weapons.

"pathetic." Shepherd sighed.

"well, what did you expect, the Covenant have been bombing them for hours and their ships have probably destroyed any reinforcements that came!" John yelled.

When all the equipment was dropped down, John hopped off the lead Pelican transport.

"who's in charge here, soldier?" John asked a scared UNSC Marine.

"uh, he is! Col. Hermann, sir!" the marine yelled. John brushed past the frightened marine, who had never seen a SPARTAN, so he had no idea what John really was. He just assumed he was a new form of UNSC Marine, which was only half of the truth. John found the Col., a tall African-American dressed in torn BDU's holding his rifle like his life depended on it.

"you in charge here, Col.?" John asked.

"yes! You gonna help us or not, Covenant have been sending mortars on our position for the past 3 days! Every air attack we've sent over there has never came back!" Hermann yelled.

"alright, you boys hang tight! Come tomorrow morning, my men and I will take care of the Covenant." John said. Night soon fell. For some odd reason, the shelling stopped. John could only guess that the Covenant were trying to get some sleep as well. He heard the sound of soft guitar playing and turned his head. He found Shepherd sitting in front of a large campfire with the 141 and a lot of Marines around him. John almost smiled at that sight; Shepherd was actually very likable. You could get along with him very easily, and he was also a good man to be with in the field. But sometimes Shepherd was too laid back, like he didn't care about his life sometimes.

"hey Shepherd, why'd you bring your board down here?" Foley asked.

"I'm hoping that I'll get some good tubes tomorrow morning. We managed to track where the Covie mortar rounds are coming from, and there's some pretty good tubes down there. I'm gonna hit them." Shepherd said with a smile, putting his acoustic away.

"you sure, that's Charlie territory." Ghost said. Shepherd slowly stood up and looked at his men.

"Charlie don't surf! Come tomorrow, I'm gonna hit those beaches and give 'em what for." Shepherd said very determined. John only snorted; no way Shepherd could surf in Covenant territory.

December 18th, 2528

Unknown planet, unknown system

Early the next morning, the attack Pelicans, along with the Hornets, the Falcons, one Longsword, and the Little Birds were getting prepped and ready for the rest of the day.

"alright people, let's get moving! I want rockets in the back, small arms in the front! And someone secure my board the right way this time!" Shepherd screamed as he climbed onboard.

"General, are you sure about this?" the Col yelled.

"I'm never sure about anything, Col!" Shepherd yelled as he climbed onboard the lead Little Bird chopper. A bugler, courtesy of Shepherd, blasted out an old Calvary tune as the aircraft took to the skies. As the choppers and Pelicans flew away,

"alright, I want this tight and quick! We're gonna destroy all the opposition we can find, get a foot hold and start surfing!" Shepherd yelled. As the choppers got closer,

"MacTavish, get the music on!" Shepherd yelled.

"what music?" a Marine yelled.

"Wagner! The men love it, and it scares the shit outta the Covenant!" Carter yelled. He wasn't a fan of classical music, but he liked Ride of the Valkyrie's. As the song was blasted over all the speakers at full volume, the Covenant anti-air Wraiths opened fire in an attempt to destroy the oncoming choppers.

"let 'em have it!" Shepherd yelled. Almost immediately, the Covie ground forces were being slaughtered. Wraith tanks, anti-air emplacements, foot soldiers, all of them were destroyed. Even buildings weren't spared from the human's wrath.

"okay, that's it! Set us down!" Shepherd ordered. The attack Pelicans landed and everyone got on the ground. Problem was, not all the resistance was destroyed, so they came under heavy plasma fire. Almost everyone hit the dirt, only John-117 and Gen. Shepherd stood up. Plasma mortars began raining all over the beach. John did get down, but not Shepherd, he was just enjoying the scene. When a mortar got to close for comfort, however,

"Noble 6, Ramius, I want you two to napalm the beachhead on the opposing side, gimme some breathing room!" Shepherd ordered.

"copy that, General, napalm ordinance incoming." Noble 6 said, piloting the Longsword across the beach head, sending the trees up in flames.

"hey son, you smell that?" Shepherd asked a UNSC Marine.

"sir?"  
>"I love the smell of napalm in the morning. Smells like…..victory." Shepherd hungrily growled.<p>

"care to explain, general?"  
>"a couple years back, I was stationed on some Podunk ass planet constantly under siege by the Covenant. A whole bunch of Grunts were defending a large hill, so I ordered it to be napalmed for about 15 hours. When it was all over, not a soul in sight. That smell, I stuck with me. One day kid, this war is gonna end." Shepherd said. The Marine didn't really know what Shepherd said, because Shepherd had actually lied to him, but it sounded a little bit re-assuring.<p>

"okay boys, get my surf board!" Shepherd yelled.

"sir, I don't think it's safe to surf this beach." MacTavish said.

"if I say it's safe to surf, then it's safe to surf! Get me my board!" Shepherd yelled, taking his hat off, along with his jacket and T-shirt. MacTavish reluctantly brought Shepherd his board. Shepherd eagerly grabbed it and ran off into the water, amidst the flying plasma mortars. Everyone laughed when the saw the general surfing the waves like a pro, barely dodging the flying mortar rounds.

"what is he, crazy or something, he's gonna die out there!" a Marine yelled. After hearing Shepherd whoop in glee,

"he may be crazy, but he sure is enjoying himself." Kat replied, smiling. After more mortar rounds nearly killed the general, Shepherd headed back to shore and walked on the beach, thoroughly soaked, but thoroughly happy as well.

"you enjoy yourself, Shepherd?" Buck asked.

"if the Covenant don't glass this planet, and I survive to see the end of the war, I'm gonna claim this beach as my vacation spot, I like the waves here." Shepherd said, putting his clothes back on.

"okay people, let's take the Pelicans up this river, destroy any and all Covenant forces we find." John said. The attack Pelicans were loaded up, the music was blasting, and the 141 was off on a Covie killing spree. However, the Covenant sent down several Banshees and shot the Pelican's down.

"fuck, we're gonna have to call for backup." Shepherd muttered. Then he discovered that his surf board was destroyed.

"YOU MOTHERFUCKERS!" Shepherd screamed, firing his M4A1 carbine rifle wildly at the fleeing banshees. It was all for naught, however, his bullets never reached the Banshees.

"Cmdr., we need a pick-up! Like right fucking now, the Covenant toasted our Pelicans, and now we're stuck in a river that would make Vietnam look like a desert! How copy, over?" John yelled.

"we'll send down some Pelican's, Chief!" Brown replied. After several hours of seemingly non-stop fighting which resulted in a lot of dead Covenant soldiers, Pelicans came down and picked up the 141. While they flew back to the ship, they found several Covenant cruisers glassing the planet.

"good thing we got outta there when we did." John muttered.

April 16th, 2531

Covenant-occupied territory

Rishi Maze asteroid field

_UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun_

On the bridge of the _Morning Sun_,

"any fresh contacts?" Miranda asked.

"nothing. If there are any Covenant vessels out there, they must be rigged for a silent running." Cortana said.

"Dr. Brown, if we emitted a large blast of 115 radiation, could that damage any Covenant cloaking systems they might be using?"

"it's possible, but I wouldn't advise it." the doctor said.

"alright. Hey, that asteroid field over there. Could we park the ship in there and perform any guerilla attacks on the Covenant, I mean, we know they're here, there's no denying that fact." Cortana said.

"hmm. It might be possible. But we're gonna have to be very careful, those asteroids are filled with an unknown material that's playing hell with my scanners." Brown said.

"alright. Take us in there." Commander Keyes ordered. The supercarrier flew into the asteroid field and armed her nukes to be used in the attacks.

"alright, take us around this large asteroid here. Shit, we got incoming!" Richtofen said.

"what is it?" Brown asked.

"two CCS-class cruisers and a CAS-class assault carrier are moving to intercept us! And they're closing in on us, fast!" Richtofen snapped.

"The nukes we were gonna use, can we use them as dummy mines?" Miranda asked.

"yeah, so what?" Cortana replied.

"we can release a large amount of 115 radiation from the aft engines to blind their sensors! We drop off some SHIVA nukes, they fly blind into the trap and we detonate-" Brown said.

"do it!" Miranda ordered.

The radiation was released in the form of a yellow-colored gassy mist which the Covenant ships flew into. Their sensors were damaged, so they continued to fly blind after the human vessel-straight into the SHIVA-bombs that were left behind. Once they were within range,

"send 'em back to hell." Brown muttered. Richtofen flipped the switch. The nukes went off, destroying all the Covenant ships that were affected.

"gimme a sitrep." Miranda ordered.

"all Covenant ships destroyed. But that little explosion created a large stir, the main fleet here's moving after us." Brown said.

"how many ships?" Miranda asked.

"you don't wanna know." Cortana said.

"how many?" Miranda asked again.

"I'm reading 32 assault carriers. No way we could stand up to them." Cortana said.

"send half of the nukes that we got. That oughta take care of them." John said, walking on the bridge.

"sir?" Brown asked.  
>"send half the nukes we have. This navel base is one of the largest the Covenant have, and I intend to destroy it. Launch half of our nukes. " John ordered. A insanely massive wave of nuclear bombs and missiles flew away from the Morning Sun toward the enemy fleet and naval base. When they all detonated, nothing survived the blast. The Morning Sun was on the far end of the blast radius. Cortana quickly performed a slipstream jump and left the blast, sparing the ship and her crew from a grisly fate.<p>

"how many nukes we got?" Miranda asked.

"12." Richtofen said. That wasn't what anyone wanted to hear.

"we're never doing that again, we can't be wasting our nukes like that." Miranda ordered. Everyone on the bridge agreed.

August 14th, 2538

Unknown planet, Outer Colonies

_UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun_

_Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!_ was all Cpt. John Price thought as he ran through the cold forest. Plasma bombs exploded all over the place. Price managed to outrun them, but he knew that he was outnumbered and outgunned. He still couldn't believe that the plan had gone to shit. Price would be the sniper for the small strike team that John-117 had sent down to recon a large Covenant base the Morning Sun would bomb the next day. However, the whole squad save for him were made of Innies. Price didn't trust them at all, they weren't professional soldiers. And when they got caught, they panicked and attempted to run. The Covenant easily slaughtered them and gave chase to Price. Now, he was all alone, with a slightly burned right leg and all he had was his Intervention sniper rifle. His other weapon, a MA5B assault rifle had been lost when he ran. Thinking that he was far enough, he quickly collapsed on the thin snow and turned around to face his enemy.

"there you are." he slowly thought to himself. He took aim with his rifle at a large Brute holding a spike rifle and fired. The monster's head flew off, causing the group of soldiers to go in a panic. Price quickly did the bolt and fired at an Elite, bringing him down too. With quick precision and with a cold, calculating efficiency, the lone sniper brought down the entire advancing group of Covenant soldiers. Price slapped a new clip in his rifle, quickly got up and kept on running. A needle then pierced his left thigh, causing him to collapse. Turning around in pain, he pulled out his M1911 pistol and fired off all eight rounds. It would've brought down a human, but a Grunt was a little tougher. Price stood up and ran away from the Covenant horde. Periodically, he would turn around and fire off a couple rounds at some Elites or Brutes. Due to all the snow and freezing conditions, the Covenant were at a slight disadvantage, their armor was in bright colors. Price was all decked out in white, so he blended in rather well. Using that to his advantage, he began hunting down the squad. The hunters soon became the hunted. But he couldn't keep it up forever, his wounds eventually caught up to him.

"say goodbye, motherfucker." he whispered as he took aim at an Elite Major, the last real threat. With him gone, the Jackals and Grunts would have no leadership, which is what the veteran sniper wanted. Holding his breath in, he painfully held his rifle up and squeezed the trigger. The Elite never knew what hit him as the back of his head was blasted to pieces. Collapsing on the ground, he flicked open a blue flare and tossed it in the snow.

"just kill me, you bastards, I'm too tired to fight anymore." Price sighed. Price's radio then crackled, causing the veteran sniper to sigh in relief.

"_strike team alpha, this is Sierra-117. Come in, alpha, are you there?_" John-117's voice came on.

"Sierra-117, this is Captain Price. The team is dead, the mission was a failure. I say again, I'm the last one standing."

"come again, Captain Price?"  
>"look, I just shot my way through a hell-ridden forest because the men you gave me were incompetent. I need a pick-up if you got one."<p>

"right. I'll send a Pelican down, we can still assault the base, we'll just have to do it from orbit. Get some rest, Price. 117 out."

Scoffing, Price muttered to himself,

"yeah, that's all I can do right now, just get some bloody rest."

December 4th, 2541

Unknown planet, Outer Colonies

_UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun_

The blaring sun beat down on Sgt Roebuck, making him wipe his brow for the thousandth time. He still couldn't believe he and the rest of the sergeants volunteered for this mission. His squad (Roebuck, Polonsky, Miller), along with Reznov's squad (Reznov, Chernov, Petrenko) and Foley's squad (Foley, Dunn, Ramirez) volunteered for to perform a small strike in a massive Covenant airbase. They couldn't send in the SPARTAN's and ODST's; the risk was too great. Roebuck was given command, with Reznov as his XO and Foley as the 3rd officer.

"Roebuck, anything?" Dunn asked.

"it's just as we thought. I'm seeing four shade turrets at the corners of the base. Might be a little hard to get past those. As usual, Grunts are running around doing manual labor. Three split chins walk the perimeter, two are Elite minors, the third is a Spec Ops Elite. The minors just walk around the main base, but the Spec Ops makes random changes to his patrol; it'll be hard to knock him out. Jackals with Needle Rifles line the top of the main structure. We got at least 10 Wraith tanks in the main garage, with around 43 Ghosts for support. We got Elites, Brutes, and Grunts all around the place by the dozens. No Hunters, that's the good thing. Still, shouldn't be that hard to take and destroy." Roebuck said, cocking his B.A.R.

"alright, let's take 'em." Ramirez said.

"don't get cocky, Ramirez, that's what they want." Reznov warned the Hispanic soldier.

"alright people. Keep your eyes and ears open. Chernov, you got that sniper rifle ready?" Roebuck asked the Russian soldier. Chernov pulled out the DG-7 sniper rifle Richtofen gave him. Since Chernov was the best marksmen in the small unit, he would be the sniper.

"good. Take care of those Jackals once we give the signal. Once they're all down, then you can help us on the ground."

"just give me the signal." Chernov said, charging the rifle.

"alright people. Let's move out." Roebuck ordered. The small group of soldiers ran down the small mountain and took the long way around the Covenant base. Chernov slowly got up to the cliff, clicked the scope open on the rifle and peered through the sights. Down below, Roebuck stopped next to a Wraith tank.

"Foley, the C4." Roebuck whispered. Foley reached into his jacket and pulled out a small package of explosives. Roebuck took it and slapped it on the back of the tank.

"into position." Roebuck whispered. The small team quickly dispersed and hid away from the Covenant soldiers. The Wraith powered up and moved toward the rest of the tanks, all parked in line-by-line formation. Just what Roebuck wanted.

"Miller, now." Roebuck whispered. Miller pulled out the detonator and pressed the button. The wraith tank went up in a brilliant flash of fire, causing the rest of the tanks to go up as well.

"GO! GO! GO!" Roebuck screamed. The small force came out of hiding, firing their machine guns and catching the Covenant off guard. Grunts were immediately slaughtered, and several Elites had their shields down. They were killed instantly. Chernov immediately opened fire. On the Grunts inside the shade turrets, not the Jackal snipers. While the strike force didn't have to deal with the turrets, the snipers were a problem. For now, they were stuck.

"Chernov! Get rid of those Jackals, they're being a pain in the ass!" Foley yelled over the comm.

"I'll take care of them." the Russian calmly replied. One by one, the Jackal's began falling at his whim.

"lets it over with!" Polonsky yelled, reloading his M1 Garand rifle and slapping the bayonet on.

"kill anyone you see! But we stay with the main objective, the destruction of this base!" Roebuck yelled. Everyone got out from their cover and opened fire on the Covenant soldiers. Elites and Grunts slowly began falling down.

"Ramirez! Over here, bring that C4 over to the main power generator!" Foley yelled. Reznov ran over with them.

"what are you doing?" the Russian asked.

"finishing the mission." Ramirez simply said. Slapping all the C4 they had on the main generator,

"Roebuck! We got the bomb ready!" Reznov yelled.

"EVERYONE GET THE HELL OUT! YOU TOO, CHERNOV!" Reznov screamed loudly. Chernov jumped down, shouldered the sniper rifle and pulled out his Gali assault rifle now that he was in close quarters.

"where's the extraction point?" Chernov asked, firing his rifle at a Jackal.

"at the green smoke!" Dunn yelled.

"where's that?" Foley asked. Everyone then realized that the green smoke was down at the waterfall. The base had been constructed on top of a large waterfall that would surely kill them. Roebuck sighed in frustration; this mission was not going as planned. But they didn't have a choice.

"OOOHHHHHHHHHHH, !" Roebuck screamed as he and the rest of the strike force jumped off the cliff face and into the freezing water. An insanely massive explosion was heard as the base was reduced to smoldering metal, if even more then that. The water fall carried the soldiers down into the massive river below, thoroughly drenching all the soldiers.

"I hate you, Roebuck!" Dimitri yelled as he began paddling down the river.

"good!" the sergeant yelled back. They eventually washed up on the river next to the green smoke. All their weapons and equipment had been washed away in the fall, so they were now defenseless. But not for long, a heavily armed Pelican dropship flew down with Mickey at the controls. The back hatch opened up with Sgt. Buck, Gen. Shepherd, and Carter-259 waiting them.

"you destroy that base?" Shepherd asked.

"what the hell do you think, General?" Reznov asked angrily, spitting out water.

"you wanna say that to my face again, Sergeant?" Shepherd warned. Reznov wanted to reply, but thought against it and stayed shut.

"alright, get on board, Commander Keyes wants to debrief you." Carter said.

July 24th, 2552

Epsilon Eridani System

_UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun_

The day had come, the day that everyone feared, the day that no-one wanted to come: The Fall of Reach. The _UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun_ had been well prepared for this day; the Arbiter had modified the supercarrier with even more weapons: plasma turrets, point-defense laser guns, more powerful energy shielding, plasma torpedoes, anything short of an energy projector was added to the supercarrier. Thel said that the ship was now capable of taking on two Covenant Supercarriers and win, although the rest of the crew didn't want to take that chance. In the mess hall, the Task Force 141were getting ready for the battle. John looked at his squad. He saw the same thing in their eyes that he was currently feeling: we can't save Reach. He quickly banished those thoughts from his head.

"you all know what to do." John said. There wouldn't be no long speeches to raise morale; that would be a waste. Everyone knew what their job was. As they headed to the hanger bay,

"Ramius says he has a present for us, you gonna tell us what it is?" John asked the Russian pilot. They followed the Russian pilot to the far end of the main hanger bay.

"I started work on them about 5 weeks after Harvest. I wanted a transport vehicle that can deliver and evacuate troops in a real hurry, while carrying enough firepower to rival a gunship. So, I came up with these." Ramius said, turning in a set of lights. What they saw were Huey helicopters. But these Huey's were _huge._ They could rival the size of a Covenant Phantom dropship.

"one of these choppers can carry a full squad of SPARTAN's, so I built several choppers. Armament is eight M134 mini-guns, ten M41 LAAG's, twelve AIE-486 machine guns, six M60's, eight M240's, four M247's, chain-load UV-32 rockets, and 102mm HE rockets mounted on the wings. I've estimated a 3.5 trillion rounds for the machine guns alone." the Russian said. Once again, everyone was stunned by what Marco Ramius could do to a flying machine.

"I've said it once, and I'll say it again: you are a wonderworker when it comes to flying machines." Kat said.

"I know I am." Nikolai said, with a hint of tiredness that one could mistake for being very cocky.

"don't get cocky, Nikolai; I'll shoot you myself." John said, sizing up one of the Huey's. Nikolai got humbled again.

"so, who's going down?" Dutch asked, readying his SPARTAN laser.

"uh, the entire one-four-one except Miranda." John said.

"how come everyone except her goes down to the planet surface?" Emile asked.

"because she's a command officer, she's too important to lose." John said, spinning a Mini-Gun to see how fast it could move.

"so, how're we gonna do this?" Foley asked, loading his SCAR-H rifle.

"we cloak the ship, put it in an atmosphere, unload the choppers, put the ship back into orbit, and kill as many Covenant as we can before we die." John said.

"or before we get the hell off of that doomed rock." Dunn muttered.

"alright. Brown, cloak the ship and bring us down to the surface. Pick a spot that's rather far away, I don't wanna attract any unwanted attention." John said.

"alright, I'll put her down near the Visagrad Relay, 12,000 kilometers above the surface." Brown said.

"you're not coming with us, are you?" Dutch asked.

"why else would I bring this?" Brown replied, holding up his MP5K submachine gun.

"he's stubborn, just like you Chief." Cortana joked.

"alright, I guess you can come along. But try not to get shot, you're the only one who knows this ship better than anyone else."

The _Morning Sun_ cloaked and went down to the planet surface. The hanger bay doors opened and several massive Huey choppers flew out, ready to take on the Covenant.

"alright people, listen up! We're here to give the Covenant hell, short and simple! One thing though, no one sets foot on the ground! We stay in the air the whole battle unless I say otherwise!" John ordered.

"seems like a waste of an order." Jorge muttered.

"looks like we won't get to use the toys we stashed on this planet all those years ago." Hudson muttered. Hudson was referring to when Jorge and Hudson 'borrowed' a Pelican modified with an FTL engine; they went to Reach with a large cache of Wunderwaffe weapons, and a Pack-a-Punch machine. They buried the cache underneath Sword Base, in a spot where no one could ever find them. Only those two knew of that secret stash.

"alright people, let's move out! Hey Shepherd, why does your Huey come with a bomb on the bottom?" John asked. On one of the Huey's, the one that Shepherd was piloting, a standard aircraft bomb was mounted on the bottom of the fuselage.

"uh, no reason, just some extra firepower!" Shepherd replied.

"whatever." John muttered.

"think he's up to something?" Cortana asked.

"I think everyone's up to something, Cortana, I just don't know what it is." John said.

"he's still mad about the surfboard, isn't he?"  
>"he probably is."<p>

As the small flight of Huey helicopters flew over the mountain range, they spotted two Falcon choppers.

"hey, is that Noble Team?" Price asked, viewing the choppers through the sight on his rifle.

"it is!" Romeo yelled, spotting the same thing.

"hey Chief, what's Noble Team doing here?" Mason asked.

"how 'bout you go down there and ask them yourself?" John smirked.

"smart ass." Mason sighed. The Huey's kept their distance away from the SPARTAN's. as Noble Team engaged the small Covenant landing party,

"hey John, can we shoot something now?" Makarov yelled.

"go ahead, I'll take us down! All choppers, follow me!" John yelled. Nikolai was actually piloting the Huey, but John was manning the weapons in the second seat. The choppers got low to the ground and opened fire with their numerous weapons and the soldiers onboard, firing their small arms.

"fuck yeah!" Anatoly yelled, firing his Draganov sniper rifle, nailing several Grunts.

"let's kill these fuckers!" Chernov yelled, firing his rifle into several Jackals. Reznov barely hid his smile; at the whole beginning, Reznov considered Chernov a pacifist, a man who couldn't bring himself to kill. But 30 years of pure hell turned him into a bloodthirsty soldier; Reznov even considered him even more violent then even himself. That slightly scared the veteran Russian, wondering what Chernov would do. But he knew he would show restraint when it was needed. The Choppers then flew away from the brief skirmish.

"should we inform command and tell them the Covenant are here?" Woods yelled.

"I think that's a bad idea, no one's supposed to know we exist!" Veronica yelled.

"fuck, you're right." the American grumbled. He resumed firing his Commando at the Covenant troops on the ground.

"alright people, we're leaving now! We're gonna find where the Covenant are landing their troops, and then, we're gonna kill 'em all!" John yelled. This was a rather brief and extremely small skirmish, but they showed the Covenant there were more then just Army Troopers and SPARTAN's on Reach. However, John wasn't planning on finding the Covenant landing position; he was planning on protecting Noble Team, making sure they all survived the battle. Doc Brown took notice of this, however.

"hey John, what are you doing?" Brown asked.

"you're wrong Doc, I can change the future. I'm gonna do whatever I can to keep Noble Team alive, so I'm gonna follow them wherever they go; I'm gonna do whatever I can to keep them alive." John said.

"you do realize that we barely have enough fuel to make it to Sword Base from Visagrad Relay, don't you?" Cortana asked.

"that's why I prefer using Element 115 instead of regular gasoline."

"all these choppers are powered by 115?" Cortana asked.

"yup. All these, and the one chopper you, me, and Ramius put under Sword Base." John whispered. As the Huey's flew south towards Sword Base, night soon fell.

"hey, Hudson, how long do you think it's gonna take us to get to wherever we're going?" Buck asked the former CIA agent.

"I don't know, sergeant. It'll take a while." Hudson sighed. As they flew across the Viery Territory, the flight of choppers stopped.

"hey Makarov, you and your friends are gonna help me with something! Can you rig a bunch of explosives to hover in mid-air while cloaked?" John yelled.

"that is an insult to my abilities, I could do so much more." Makarov said.

"can you do it?" Roebuck and McNamara asked, annoyed by Makarov's cockiness.

"yeah, it'll take a few minutes." the Russian sighed. After rigging up the explosives,

"okay people, let's get this over with. I see several Covenant cloaking spires and shielding domes, we're gonna plant some bombs in them, leave a present for the Covenant." John yelled. The choppers landed on the surface, and the 141 began planting various explosives all along the valley, all meant to surprise the Covenant. The next day, the Huey's were at Sword Base.

"okay people, listen up! We're gonna rain fire on these Covenant assholes, but we do not set foot on the ground! Also, let's try and make some trouble for that Corvette!" John ordered. As they Hueys roared towards Sword Base, they caught the attention of two Falcons carrying Noble Team.

"local militia?" Jorge asked.

"more then likely, but keep your head in the game!" Carter ordered. The Hueys paid them no mind. They turned their attention to the Corvette, but were almost shot down by all the Banshees that were flying around.

"new objective, shoot down those fucking banshees!" John yelled. Problem was, there were so many banshees, that by the time that Emile and Noble 6 got the over-watch to get rid of them, the TF-141 was still in the air.

"who the hell are these guys?" Emile asked.

"I don't know, but they're messing up my aim! Goddammit, get outta the way!" Noble 6 yelled. The Huey's were totally oblivious to the fact they were almost shot down by Noble Team.

"pour it on them!" John yelled. Mason's Huey got hit with a plasma cannon and began spinning wildly.

"Mason, you alright?" Shepherd asked. No reply.

"Mason! Mason, talk to me!" Mickey yelled, flying his Huey to the left.

"I'm fine, damn buggers got my left engine!" Mason yelled through gritted teeth.

"hey guys, we got Longswords on our six! I got a feeling they're gonna blow that Corvette outta the sky!" Weaver yelled.

"let's the get hell outta here!" Emile yelled, reloading his shotgun. The Corvette was soon shot down by an ODP. Nikolai wasn't happy.

"THOSE FUCKERS MADE ME LOSE MY VODKA! I'M GONNA KILL YOU!" the drunken Russian yelled, firing his submachine gun at no one in particular.

"Nikolai, stop messing around!" Dempsey yelled.

The Huey choppers flew away from Sword base, one of them having a burning engine.

"we need to set her down and make repairs, I can't hold her forever!" Mason yelled.

"fine, do it!" Hudson yelled through gritted teeth.

"this wasn't really how I expected the mission to go." Dunn whispered to Foley.

"ooh rah." the sergeant responded. The choppers landed on a large plateau far away from the ONI base.

"so what's the damage?" Emile asked.

"looks like the left rotary engine got hit with a super-heated plasma round. It's not pretty, we'll have to yank the whole mounting." Ramius said, inspecting the damaged engine.

"we can't do that here, we have a war to fight." Dutch reminded him.

"I know that, so I'll have to yank the Sync-Coil out of the engine and pray it still holds." the Russian said. He reached in and pulled out what looked to be a battle rifle-sized piece of equipment that glowed a sickly orange.

"that's no good now." he muttered, tossing the piece of trash behind his shoulder extremely casually. He then climbed in the cockpit and started the engine, which started just fine.

"that's it?" Dutch asked.

"that's it. Just don't get shot there again or the engine will cave." Ramius said, hopping out of the chopper. The Huey's took off, leaving Sword Base in the distance. Their destination: The Highland Mountains.

"why are we going there again?" Jun asked.

"see if there are any Covie's we can kill." Bowman replied with a smile. For around the next two weeks, the Huey's waged guerilla 'hit-and-run' tactics against the Covenant troops scattered in the mountains. But they knew the real battle would be at the Viery Territory. The UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun, however, remained cloaked so no-one knew of it's existence.

August 12th, 2552

Viery Territory

A small strike force of UNSC Army Troopers roared across one of the plains of the Viery Territory. The Huey Choppers flew way above the main strike force.

"okay people, we're gonna give those Covenant troops as much hell as we can! See those Banshee's, we're gonna start with those first! Bring your birds down to the deck, but try not to run over a Falcon!" John yelled. The massive Huey's were soon intermingling with the strike force.

"let's see what they think of this!" Woods yelled, turning on the radio and shouldering an M202 rocket launcher.

"let's rock it!" Johnson yelled. The song was _Burden in My Hand_ by _Soundgarden_. Everyone liked that song.

"hey, check it out." Makarov said, elbowing Mickey to gain his attention.

"what?" the ODST asked. The two soldiers leaned out of Mason's Huey and focused their attention on the oncoming Banshees. When the song was at one minute and seven seconds long (1:07) when main jam came on, massive explosions rocked the valley, destroying much of the Covenant structures. Simultaneously, massive explosions appeared in the air as Banshee's were blown out of the sky. Makarov laughed happily at his handiwork.

"that's how you get it done!" he yelled. The Hueys then unleashed an awesome display of firepower as waves of hot lead and rockets came tearing at the Covenant force. Despite it all, there was one bad downside to the whole thing: Makarov had put the song on a radio frequency that couldn't be traced, but could be heard by all UNSC forces, effectively jamming the signal. The Huey's just rained hell on the Covenant forces; Wraith tanks, Shade turrets, Ghost light-transports and anything else the Covenant had on the ground were quickly destroyed.

"okay guys, follow me through that canyon!" John yelled. The choppers roared through the canyon weapons blazing, destroying anything they touched. Unfortunately, Mickey's chopper, which was carrying Jorge, Hudson, Carter, Kat, Richard (Noble 6) and Weaver, flew dangerously close to where Kat and Noble 6 were on the ground to destroy a Covie AA battery. Mickey swiftly destroyed it with is rockets.

"Mickey! Get your ass over here, ASAP!" Cpt. Dare yelled.

"copy that captain!" Mickey grumbled. The large chopper slowly lifted away from the destroyed AA gun.

"she's got one fat ass." Weaver whispered to Richard, referring to the Huey.

"probably because we're carrying several SPARTAN's." Richard said.

"that, or we got the remains of a Warthog on the rear boom." Hudson pointed out.

"fuck. I got it." Jorge muttered. Risking his life, he crawled out to the rear boom and kicked the remains of the Warthog off the boom, allowing the chopper to fly farther and faster away from the destroyed gun.

"Mickey, get us outta here!" Carter yelled.

"where are we going?" Weaver yelled, adjusting his eye patch.

"hey Chief, everyone's wondering the same thing, where are we heading?" Price yelled, reloading his rifle.

"see that spire? We're gonna take it!" John yelled. He piloted his Huey through the bubble shield, which was totally unaffected by the EMP blast. The remaining choppers soon followed suit.

"why the hell didn't we get that?" Viktor yelled.

"we never found it!" Makarov yelled, firing his M4 rifle at spire, to no affect.

"let's see what we can make of it!" John yelled. He opened fire with the Huey's rockets, but there wasn't any visible damage.

"Cortana, any suggestions?" Ramius asked.

"I'd suggest hitting the center of the structure with high-yield explosives." Cortana said, appearing on the small holo-projector set up on the control panel set up between the pilot and gunner's seat in the Huey cockpit.

"and if we don't have any?" John said, going through the chopper's array of weapons.

"then you're shit outta luck." Cortana replied with a smirk.

"alright then. All choppers, target the center of the spire with everything you got." John ordered. A massive wave of bullets and rockets flew toward the middle of the spire, but it did absolutely nothing. None of them noticed the two SPARTAN's board the spire and deactivate it's shields. Only then did they notice when they saw a UNSC frigate fly over them.

"we gotta leave, now!" Ramius yelled, piloting the Huey away from the massive war machine. The Huey's flew away, catching the comm message stating that MAC rounds have been authorized to destroy the spire.

"MAC rounds in atmo, what are they, crazy?" MacTavish yelled in shock.

"one way to get their attention!" Shepherd yelled from the cockpit. The spire was destroyed, only for the frigate to get vaporized by a Covenant Supercarrier. "RAMIUS! GET US THE HELL OUTTA HERE! NOW!" John yelled.

* * *

><p><strong>Like? Don't Like? If there are any errors here concerning the Battle of Reach, please tell me so I can fix it. Thanks for reading, and review!<strong>


	4. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer****: I don't own anything. Just the UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun, the Wunderwaffe Cannons, the DG weapons, and Dr. Emmett Brown. Everything else belongs to Microsoft, Bungie, Infinity Ward, and Activision. Enjoy!**

* * *

><p>Chapter 3<p>

While Noble Team on the ground were busy hiding in a cave, Noble Team in the Task Force 141 was high up in the sky, surrounded by clouds to prevent them from being shot down. They overheard Auntie Dot's transmission about the UNSC sending a part of the fleet that'll rendezvous at Reach in two days.

"forty eight hours? She calls that imminent?" Kennedy yelled, reloading his China Lake.

"look. Who's your money on this time?" he asked. He was referring to Kat and Carter arguing about what to do with the supercarrier.

"her." McNamara replied.

"you always pick her."

"those two were always close. I heard that the original Noble Team, every member except Carter and Kat died. Notice they got even more closer after they crashed on that planet?" McNamara asked, reloading his rifle. Over on Mickey's chopper,

"that supercarrier's crushing us, and we're gonna wait for backup? They'll be backing up a goddamn graveyard!" Kat protested.

"all the nukes are either out of system or went down with the ships that carried them in. And the _Morning Sun_ ran outta nukes five years back, remember?"

"we still have another option." Kat said. As she was about to explain her option, Ramius' Huey flew up and John-117 jumped onboard.

"I overheard your argument, don't ask me how, I just did. No, we're not gonna use the Wunderwaffe cannons, do you know how many zombies will be here if we used them?" John said, reminding them that if they used any weapons powered by 115, a zombie apocalypse was a certain guarantee.

"alright then, you tell me, what's your plan?" Kat smirked, daring the SPARTAN-II to tell everyone on how they were gonna destroy the Supercarrier.

"we use a slipspace drive as a makeshift bomb. The frigate UNSC Savannah will soon dock with Anchor 9, we use that ship's slipspace drive. Now as for orbit-capable transport, that's easy: The Sabre Program Launch/Research Range near Farkas Lake. Nikolai and Richard will steal a Sabre, fly up to Anchor 9, get the slipstream bomb, blow up the supercarrier, problem solved." John said.

It seemed like a foolproof plan, just one problem, however.

"what makes you think Col. Holland will approve of the slipstream bomb, what makes you think anyone will approve of this?" Carter asked.

"Noble Team's asking the colonel right now. Take a look." John said, pointing at a cave where a couple SPARTAN super soldiers were near the entrance.

"we're gonna steal those Sabres before Noble gets there. Oh, and one more thing. We don't leave any witnesses behind, so we kill _everyone_. Understand?" John ordered.

"don't you think that's a little too harsh?" Cortana asked once John got in the co-pilot seat.

"what, shooting human soldiers, we've done it before on previous ops. We're a Black Ops squad, remember? We're not supposed to exist."

"caveman." Cortana muttered.

John just smiled.

"get us to Farkas lake." John ordered the Russian pilot. From their current position, it took them around two days to get to the launch facility.

"there they are, let's do this!" Ghost yelled, firing his ACR. The choppers landed and everyone stormed the complex, shooting anyone who got in their way. An Elite roared and activated his energy sword.

"you don't scare me!" Woods yelled, firing his Commando at the alien, dropping it. A grunt ran forward with active grenades, his target was Kennedy. The former American president blew the alien to pieces.

"stay dead, you motherfuckers!" he yelled, firing his China Lake at more Covenant. They quickly moved into the facility, killing everyone in sight. It was more like a slaughter. When they got to the main hanger,

"Ramius, Richard, get in and make 'em pay." Jorge said. The two soldiers climbed in the Sabre jet and took off. The rest of the team quickly ran back to their Huey's and took off.

"can you trust them, especially Ramius?" Cortana asked.

"he's a good pilot, I can trust him."

"even though he's a little crazy when it comes to flying aircraft?"  
>"what's your point?"<br>"my point is, I think it' would've been better to pick someone who shows more….. Restraint."

"what, Nikolai doesn't show restraint?" John asked.

"YEAH, I'M RIGHT HERE YOU SONS OF BITCHES! COME AND GET ME! YOU WANT SOME MORE, HERE! I SAVE PLENTY FOR YOU!" Nikolai screamed as he fired numerous missiles at the oncoming Covenant Banshees. Richard-B312 had never been more scared in his life. He was pretty sure he peed his pants, although he didn't really care at the moment.

"um, Nikolai, can you not fly the Sabre at near-light speed?" Richard asked.

"I can't tell how fast I'm going, I broke the speedometer." the Russian cackled. A plasma explosion occurred too close for comfort, causing Richard to cringe. And what made it all worse was that Ramius blasting _Different World_ by _Iron Maiden_ on the speakers. And they were being broadcasted to all UNSC forces, including the one's on the ground. On the comm,

"hey Ramius, can you turn it down?" Makarov yelled.

"no! Damn, Reach is a mess! It looks like when I was in Afghanistan with the Soviets!" he yelled. Unfortunately, _everyone_ heard that.

"Nikolai, shut up and do your job!" Price yelled back. The Russian just cut the comm link.

After all the remaining Covenant ships were destroyed,

"Noble 6, this is Anchor 9. The package is ready." the dock station said. The Sabre jet docked at a port and the SPARTAN was more than happy to climb out and get away from the crazed Russian. On the comm,

"Noble Six, this is Holland." Col. Holland said. With no choice, Richard responded.

"Go ahead, Colonel." he said, readying the drive.

"We've flagged a Corvette-class vessel on a predicted docking track with our target. Get our makeshift bomb on that Corvette, and we have our delivery system."

"I understand, Colonel." Richard said, cutting the Col off.

"As she's already donated her slipspace drive to the cause, the _Savannah_ will be joining you to provide local fire support." the frigate _Savannah_ pulled up next to the dock station.

"_UNSC _Savannah. Our wings may be clipped, but we've got your back." the frigate's captain said.

"I've stuck my neck out for Noble on this one, Lieutenant." the Col. said, sighing in frustration.

"We'll get it done Col, Noble Six out." the SPARTAN said, giving Nikolai the thumbs-up signaling that he was ready. The Sabre jet was undocked, and Nikolai once again blasted his heavy metal. They soon found the Corvette and boarded it, which was rather easy considering that Nikolai shot up all the engines and surrounding space craft with ease. He landed the jet on top of the enemy starship, put on his mask, and pulled out his AK-74u carbine machine gun that had a grenade launcher attachment. He carried a spare in case he needed it. He climbed out of the jet and got inside the Corvette along with a detachment of UNSC Army Troopers. Once inside, they got into a firefight with Covenant soldiers. His AK rifle did absolutely nothing against the energy shielding protecting the Elites. So he slung the rifle and grabbed a fallen Plasma Repeater, killing many Elites with arrogant ease. He and the troopers ran inside throughout the carrier, killing any Covenant they saw. Once the Pelican landed, they quickly rushed to the landing bay to prevent the bomb from being damaged. Once all the Covenant were dead,

"I got good news and bad news." Richard said, shouldering his DMR.

"what's the good news?"  
>"engines are fried, so the only way off this slag heap is gravity."<p>

"bad news?"  
>"timer got shot, we'll have to detonate it manually."<p>

"let me see it." the Russian muttered. After a few minutes of fixing the wiring,

"there, now we can both live." the Russian said.

"alright, is the vector set in?"  
>"put in the new navigation codes when I was in the bridge."<p>

"alright, see you on the far side." Richard said, jumping off the Corvette. Nikolai soon followed. They turned around to see the Corvette grow smaller and smaller as it neared the Supercarrier. A bright flash of light appeared and vaporized a massive chunk of the carrier, eliminating the threat. They both smiled as they fell through the atmosphere. Nikolai looked to his left and thought he saw a Covenant Fleet drop in. his last thought before he blacked out was, _We gotta bring our supercarrier into the fight_

When the two soldiers woke up, they found themselves in a snowy mountain with the destroyed carrier behind them.

"here, you'll need this." Ramius said, handing Richard his spare AK-74u rifle. The two left the mountain range and began trekking their way towards civilization.

August 23rd, 2552

New Alexandria

"this ain't good." Richard sighed as the two soldiers witnessed the city being bombed by three Corvettes.

"we gotta keep moving." Nikolai said, the two running into the city. Running past multiple dead civilians and Army troopers, they soon found a bunch of civilians and Army Troopers fighting several Brutes.

"ugly bastards." Nikolai muttered, firing his grenade launcher at a Brute Chieftain. He exploded to pieces.

"hey, where'd those two come from?" a Trooper asked, watching Nikolai and Richard gun down dozens of Covenant troops with ease.

"who cares, as long as they're helping us!" another trooper yelled. After fighting through more and more Covenant, and having to deal with the havoc of the frantic comm system, they decided 'fuck it' and ripped their comm links outta their ears, relying on themselves to survive. Which they did, after they armed several missile batteries to destroy a Covenant corvette. When the last transports flew away,

"….Ramius, Richard-312, this is TF-141, how copy, over?" Wood's voice came over the comm system of the small base the two soldiers defended.

"Woods, this is Ramius, we made it. Get those choppers over here, ASAP. Does Noble Team suspect anything?"

"well, other then the fact that you compared the Fall of Reach to the Russo-Afghan War and that you blasted Iron Maiden throughout the comm system, I'd say no one suspects a damn thing." the American said sarcastically.

"just get those choppers over here, ASAP." Richard muttered. The Hueys soon came over, and they resumed their previous business: blowing up Covenant shit in the air with Nikolai flying the lead chopper. Nikolai, however had some questions to ask before they continue fighting.

"what'd you do to my choppers?" he yelled.

"while you were up at that Corvette, we took the liberty to modify the weapons, took the M60's off, removed half of the M41's, put a Mini-Gun on a turret so we can blast troops more accurately, and we added more UV-32 rockets." John said. As they flew through New Alexandria,

"I don't think I'll ever understand why soldiers always feel the need to blast music on the radio at full volume during a battle." Cortana said as Iron Maiden was blasted through the radio.

"it pumps you up, gets you ready to blow shit up!" Roebuck yelled, firing an AT4 rocket launcher, blowing several Jackals to pieces. The Hueys continued to fly around the city, killing Covenant troops and destroying Covenant Banshees and Shade turrets. Night soon fell. The squad was rather quiet, seeing as they were witnesses to a large glassing. That made all of them shut up. John was especially quiet.

"something on your mind, John?" Cortana inquired.

"I just wished that, this whole thing never happened. I just wish that Doc Brown was wrong, that we could change the future."

"some things just happen for a reason, John, we simply can't change it." Cortana reassured the SPARTAN. He didn't feel very reassured, however. The Huey's 'parked' next to the Olympic Tower, where they saw plasma damage scarring the building.

"look at this place. Used to be the crown jewel, not anymore." Castro muttered.

"hey Chief, what's our next move?" MacTavish asked.

Suddenly, the choppers were suddenly flung to the right; a Covenant cruiser was glassing the area.

"we follow Noble Team, plain and simple! I caught their transmission with Holland, something about Sword Base and blowing it up!" John yelled as he wrenched the Huey away from the burning building. All the choppers followed him, except Shepherd's chopper.

"Shepherd, what are you doing?" Foley asked as the former general climbed out of the bay.

"nothing." he lied. He hooked his arms around the landing skid and began kicking away at the bomb attached to the underside.

"Shepherd, what are you doing?" Dunn yelled.

"you see that Phantom down there, I'm gonna blow that sucker to hell! If I could just get this bomb off!" Shepherd yelled through gritted teeth. Suddenly, the bomb gave way and dropped like a rock. It's trademark '' sound vibrated through the air before it hit it's target with the Phantom, scaring the SPARTAN's below.

"nice aim." Bowman said, reaching down to help the general. Shepherd got back in the cockpit and followed the rest of the Huey's. The trip took around five days, but they soon reached the Babd Catha Ice Shelf where Sword Base was located.

"get tactical, marines, we're taking this fight back to the Covenant!" MacTavish yelled.

"let's see what they think of this." Woods said, turning the radio on. _Sympathy For The Devil _by the _Rolling Stones_ blasted on the radio. Since they were in a valley, the music reverberated everywhere.

"we got AA turrets all over the valley, gonna make it hard on us!" Mason yelled.

"that's good, I enjoy a challenge!" John yelled as he fired waves of rockets at the turrets, destroying them. The Huey's flew rather low to the ground, destroying anything that crossed their sights. It was nothing more than a slaughter.

"they got Tyrant AA guns targeting our position!" Emile yelled. Mickey quickly destroyed them both.

"they ain't got shit!" Bowman yelled. They soon left the valley and found Sword Base. They continued firing their guns and rockets wildly, catching the attention of Noble Team.

"seriously, who the hell are those guys, local militia? Innies?" Emile asked.

"I'd focus more on the mission, not on those transports!" Carter yelled, firing his DMR at an Elite. The Hueys continued to support Noble Team, even going so far as Shepherd piloting his Huey into Sword Base itself, nearly killing himself, the rest of the soldiers onboard, and Jun-266. The Jun-266 on the ground, that is.

"light 'em up!" he yelled. The Covenant soldiers were soon reduced to blood splatter.

"Shepherd, get the hell outta there! We gotta move!" Carter yelled over the comm.

"right, I'll be there." Shepherd yelled. He pulled the Huey out of Sword Base and caught up with the rest of the group.

"alright, we gotta find a way to get underground and protect Halsey's lab."

"well, if I'm reading these numbers right, Halsey's lab is a klick and a half east, and two thousand feet underground, how the hell are we gonna get there while we're up here?" Eddie Buck asked sarcastically.

"hey wait, I'm reading a massive sink hole to the east, if I'm readying this right, it'll take us to Halsey's underground lab." Roach said.

"okay Roach, get us there." John said. Mason piloted the Huey to the sinkhole. It was big, really big.

"could probably swallow a friggen Scarab." Romeo said, reloading his rifle.

"hey, Hudson, remember our package?" Jorge whispered.

"looks like we'll get to put it to good use." Hudson whispered back, a smile on his face. The Huey's cut their engines and they all dropped like massive metal rocks as they fell down the crevice. When they got hear the lab, they reactivated their engines and flew inside the lab via a large hole that was perched on the roof of the underground cave.

"you guys see that door, that's where we'll drop you off! All Huey's stay on the ground except this one, Ramius, Cortana and I will stay up here to give you air support! Do not let one single goddamn Covenant break through to that door! Do you understand me?" John yelled.

"sir yes sir!" the 141 replied back. The Hueys landed near the door, and almost all of them were left on the ground. Jorge and Hudson went out of sight for a brief moment and then came back carrying a massive suitcase.

"what's that?" Thel asked.

"DG weapons, with a Pack-A-Punch machine!" Hudson chuckled evilly. The PAP machine was put up, and the suitcase was opened revealing a cache of Wunderwaffe weaponry to fight a small war.

"Hey Richtofen, I ever tell you how much I love the Nazi's?" Romeo said, grabbing a DG-7 sniper rifle.

"I hate the Nazi's, I only joined them to satisfy my lust for blood." the crazed German scientist cackled when he picked up his DG-2. Everyone grabbed DG weapons, some of them upgrading them. Dempsey, Takeo, Nikolai, and Richtofen were the very first to upgrade their weapons. Some of them didn't bother upgrading them, Jorge and Thel didn't upgrade their DG-8 plasma machineguns and had already mounted them on the sandbags. Everyone got their weapons locked and loaded and were ready for the fight. Noble Team, however, was very shocked to see these new guys, especially when they saw _themselves_ wearing rather advanced MJOLNIR armor and holding advanced alien-type weaponry. They also wanted to know what was with the Elite wearing rather ancient-looking armor wielding a large machine gun. From the looks of it, he was fighting _with _the new guys. The 141 removed their helmets, knowing that with all the gunfire flying in the Covenant's direction, no one would survive that. Almost everyone was armed with a DG-4 rifle, Jorge and Thel were armed with the DG-8 machineguns, Kat was armed with a modified DG-1 'Ray Gun' where she extended the barrel, put a bipod near the end of the barrel, added a vertical grip, and put on an extendable stock so she could use it like a rifle. Richtofen was armed with his DG-2, John Price, Kojo Agu, Jun-266, and Anatoly were armed with DG-7 sniper rifles.

"let's give 'em a piece of classic heavy metal." Woods said, walking to a Huey and putting on _Mein Teil _by _Rammstein_. The 141 smiled when they heard the heavy chords.

"let's rock it." Jorge grinned. Up in the sky,

"I knew they'd bring their DG weapons, I just knew it. But they don't know what the three of us brought with us, down in that ravine." Ramius said.

"just pilot the Huey." John said, sitting down. He planted his feet on left skid and gripped the triggers of an M134 Mini-Gun.

"get ready, you sons of bitches, the Demon's coming." John growled to himself. The Covenant soon arrived. The wave of gunfire flying towards them was rather horrifying, the Covenant never stood a chance. But they had something that would wear the humans down-numbers. Phantoms were constantly flying in, dropping off more and more troops and the occasional Wraith tank that would be destroyed by Nikolai.

"come on, you motherfuckers! You want some, come and get some!" Jun yelled, firing his Nazi sniper rifle, blasting Elites and Brutes to pieces with only one shot. Noble Team wanted to know where these new guys got all the advanced weapons. But the one thing they wanted to know was where did the SPARTAN's come from, namely, themselves. But they acted rather differently then normal SPARTAN's, if they were them at all. Jorge, Emile, Richard, and Jun were constantly yelling and swearing, and Carter and Kat were up front in front of the sandbags in a rather controversial position. Kat was lying on the ground, stomach down, firing her DG-1. But since the Ray Gun always jerked the user back, she asked Carter to help hold her. But how they did was, Carter kneeled down so his crotch was on her butt. If you had a dirty mind, you would think that Carter was trying to give it to Kat up the ass.

"come on, you motherfuckers, I'm right here! Chyort, I'm outta wodka, I mean ammo!" Nikolai yelled, tossing the now empty vodka bottle behind his shoulder. Up in the sky, John was raining hell down on the Covenant troops. A Covenant Phantom pulled up and sized up the Huey. Nikolai did the same.

"Ramius, what are you doing?" Cortana asked.

"EAT THIS, MOTHERFUCKER!" the crazed Russian pilot suddenly yelled, firing all the machine guns and rockets he had at the Covenant dropship. The Phantom returned the favor by firing it's main plasma cannon. Over the comm,

"hold on, SPARTAN's. I'm getting close." Halsey came over the comm.

"just get that package ready, Dr.! we'll get it off Reach!" Woods yelled into the comm before he shut it off. The Phantom was destroyed, but the Huey took a crippling shot.

"FUCK! I'M GONNA HAVE TO PUT HER DOWN!" Ramius yelled.

"Nikolai, keep her steady!" Weaver yelled. Nikolai began spinning the Huey wildly to give everyone the belief that he was losing control and that they would crash.

"141, you're on your own! You're in command now, Carter! Try not to bang Kat to much if you want this team to survive! Sierra-117 out!" John yelled over the comm.

"did you really have to put that last bit in there?" Cortana asked as John put her data chip back in his helmet.

"no, but I decided to anyway. Nikolai, get us to the crevice, our ride's waiting there for us." John said.

"I'll try and make it look convincing." the Russian grumbled. The burning Huey flew forward into the crevice and crashed in the ground, creating a large explosion.

"there goes our air support." Jorge grumbled. Now that the Covenant had total air superiority, they used that to their advantage, bombing the human soldiers with Banshees and Phantoms.

"how long is that package gonna take?" Foley yelled in anger. Suddenly, they heard the sound of rotors beating. They looked to their left and found an Mil Mi-28 attack chopper slowly rising in the air. And that chopper had definitely been decked out with weapons. There were so many rockets and machine guns all over the body that it didn't really look like an attack helicopter at all, just a rotor blade, the cockpit, the rear motor turret, and nothing but rockets and machine guns.

"LIGHT 'EM UP!" John yelled. Ramius was way to happy to comply, firing off massive waves of rockets, missiles, and machine gun fire; obliterating whatever the Covenant had.

"where the hell'd they get that?" Dutch yelled.

"Cortana, is the package still ready?"

"primed and armed."

"let's give everyone a scare, shall we?" John asked with a wicked smile on his face. In the lab, Dr. Halsey was busy prepping the package so Noble Team could escort Cortana off the planet. They didn't know how important she was, but they had to get her off. Her thoughts were soon interrupted when she heard a rather loud boom, causing her lab to shake slightly. She looked over to her left with a look of concern on her face, what was going on out there?

Out in the caverns, large explosions were going off, destroying anything they touched. A modified Mi-28 'Havoc' attack chopper was the only thing flying in the air. Above the doors leading into Halsey's lab were massive cannons that fired off globs of static plasma-like energy that just destroyed anything they touched. The 141 had stopped shooting and were whooping and cheering at all the destruction.

"and now the final touch." Cortana smirked. A _massive _explosion occurred, sending everyone on the ground flying backward. The Havoc chopper was thrown back, Nikolai was desperately trying to keep control of the slightly damaged bird. Everyone on the ground slowly got up and saw that landscape in front of them had devastatingly changed. Where they were natural rocks and stone, was now a glassy appearance.

"what the hell was that?" Romeo asked. The chopper slowly landed on the ground, John and Nikolai climbing out.

"you mind telling us what the hell was that?" Kat asked.

"you mind telling me what you brought DG weapons down here?" John retorted. No one said anything after that. The silence was then broken by the sounds of weapons cocking.

"what the hell is all this, some sort of a trick?" Noble 1 yelled.

"buddy, if this was a trick, you'd all be dead by now. HEY HALSEY, OPEN THE DOOR!" Dempsey yelled, pounding on the door with his fist.

"HALSEY, YOU GOT ANY VODKA IN THERE?" Nikolai yelled, pounding on the door.

John motioned for Brown and the SPARTAN's to talk with him next to the chopper. It was rather quiet, save for the hushed talking of John, the doctor, and the 141-Noble Team SPARTAN's. They stopped chatting and the SPARTAN's walked forward somewhat threateningly and grabbed their exact counterparts in the necks. Several bright lights appeared around the super soldiers. The lights then disappeared, revealing the 7 SPARTAN's.

"you guys alright?" John asked.

"just fine. Feel kinda weird, though." Emile asked.

"what was that?" Makarov asked.

"I told them it was possible to merge with their past selves."

"you know what, this is great and all, but don't we have other stuff to do?" Reznov asked, trying to pry the doors open with a crowbar. The doors suddenly popped open, causing the Russian sergeant to fall.

"open sesame." John muttered. The 141 walked down the hallway to Halsey's lab. Noble Team and a few select marines went in. Everyone else stayed outside, including the Master Chief. Inside Halsey's lab,

"what the hell's all this?" Woods asked, slinging his Commando.

"knowledge. A birthright from an ancient civilization. This AI is its custodian, and has chosen you as her couriers." Halsey explained.

"chosen, by an AI?" Emile asked.

"by this AI, yes. Her measure of you carries as much weight as my own, perhaps more." Halsey said, moving aside to reveal the AI. Everyone was initially stunned.

"Woods, go get the Chief." Jun whispered. The Marine left the room and almost immediately returned with the SPARTAN-II.

"what, what's so important in here that I need to be here?" John asked. Carter pointed towards the AI. John removed his helmet and looked at the AI with shock.

"she never told me she was on Reach." he softly whispered to himself, so softly that even he barely heard himself. Halsey was rather shocked to see John-117, she thought he was onboard the Pillar of Autumn.

"what are your orders, doctor?" John asked. Getting over the shock,

"You're to take her to the UNSC ship-breaking yards in Aszod. There, you will find a Halcyon-class cruiser waiting to get her off planet." Halsey said.

"I understand." John said.

"do you? Mankind is outmatched. When Reach falls-and it will fall-our annihilation is all but certain. Unless...we can glean from this artifact a defense against the Covenant, a game changer. On the level of the conical bullet in the 19th century, or faster than light travel in the 23rd."

"I understand the risks, Dr. Halsey. I'll get her off Reach." John said in a rather dangerous tone, as if he was angry. Halsey pulled out the package and held it tightly in her hands. She walked to the team of SPARTAN's, but passed John. Which is what he was hoping for, that he would give it to Richard instead of him. He already had Cortana with him.

"she has chosen you. Do you have it?" Halsey said, handing the package to Richard.

"yes." Noble 6 said firmly.

"say the words, please."

"I have it." he said even more firmly. Halsey let go of the device, leaving it in Noble 6's hands. Everyone then left the lab except Halsey and John.

"how could you be here on Reach, you're supposed to be on the Pillar of Autumn." Halsey said. John remembered rather well, she visited Blue Team on the Autumn for the cancelled operation to capture Truth, Regret, and Mercy, OPERATION: RED FLAG. John remembered also that he was in cryo-sleep when the Autumn was at Aszod.

"you're a smart women, Doctor. Use your mind, but don't think conventionally. Try and imagine that there are greater forces here at work, and I'm not talking about some great divine power." John said, putting his helmet back on. He was referring to the UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun, which was, in all aspects of it, an extremely heavily armed time machine. Everyone left Halsey's lab. Halsey was rather surprised to see so many soldiers awaiting her. Some of them were ODST's, one of them wore a UNSC Marine BDU, but the rest of them were wearing uniforms from mid 20th century to the early 21st century. What was also surprising was the Arbiter, she wondered why all these soldiers didn't shoot him dead yet. Even more surprising, Halsey noticed that every soldier, including the SPARTAN's, were armed with alien-like weaponry. She had no idea they were actually Nazi weapons. She was also intrigued by the MJOLNIR armor the SPARTAN's were wearing, it looked more advanced then the current MJOLNIR Mk. V armor, especially with the chainsaw and needle gun on their forearms. She was rather shocked by what John, Cortana and Ramius did to the cave outside her lab. But they all ignored that and left the base, heading to a landing pad where several Pelicans were awaiting them.

"Dr. Halsey, Noble Three will escort you to CASTLE base." John said.

"I require no escort, Master Chief-"

"Jun, don't let anything fall in enemy hands." John ordered.

"I'll do what's necessary, Chief. Good luck." the sniper said.

"you too, Troopers." John said, ordering several UNSC Army Troopers to accompany Halsey and Jun inside the Pelican. Woods slapped Jun on the shoulder as a sign of friendship. When in reality, he put on a tracking device so they could find Jun again if they ever came back to Reach.

"Cortana, remind me where Aszod shipyard is." John said, settling down in the Pelican cockpit and taking the controls.

"Head three kilometers north, then turn right. Heading zero-five-zero. Aszod ship breaking yards will be there." Cortana replied.

"alright people, let's step to it." John ordered. The Pelicans took off and left the base, watching the underground lab be destroyed by the explosive charges set earlier.

"alright people, let's get this show on the road." John said, accelerating the aircraft through the canyon. Banshee's and Phantom dropships soon arrived on their six, however. They desperately managed to hold them off, but there were too many.

"alright people, we're taking this fight to the surface! Richard, keep that package safe! If anything happens to it, I'll kill you myself!" John yelled, putting his helmet on. The Pelicans were put on auto-pilot, flying close to the ground.

"alright people, we're leaving the Pelicans! Now!" John yelled; everyone jumped from the transports onto the hard ground. The Pelicans auto-pilot systems kicked in and flew away soldiers, drawing the attention of the Banshees.

"okay people. We gotta get to the Autumn. Let's move." Shepherd growled. The Task Force 141 moved on the ground, dropping off to a bridge and killing all the Covenant troops that were there.

"we gotta keep moving, can't waste anymore time." Dare said. They found several Mongoose ATV's and Warthogs scattered across the road with several dead Army troopers.

"they won't need these anymore." Bowman said as he gripped the controls of a Mongoose.

"true that." Foley said, cocking his M4 rifle.

"alright, we came this far. Keep moving." Carter said. The squad of soldiers continued moving down the dirt road, encountering several drop pods and a Scarab.

"forget the Scarab, keep moving!" Dutch yelled, even though he fired a

DG-5 against the war machine, which didn't do much. They continued on their current path, even having to jump a destroyed bridge. Even though it was a hard landing, they tore through the Covenant opposition and continued forward. They went through the caves and encountered dozens of Drones and Skirmishers. They got through those as well; ever intent on getting the Package onboard the Autumn.

"SPARTAN's over here! Hey, where'd all those other guys come from?" an Army Trooper asked. Once again, the Task Force 141 had to remove all witnesses, which was actually rather easy for them.

"This is Captain Keyes of the _Pillar of Autumn_. We are tracking you, Noble, but we've begun our launch sequence. Proceed to dry dock, Platform D. I'll be on it myself to receive the Package." Cpt. Keyes said over the comm, making John's heart skip a beat.

"We'll be there, sir." Carter replied.

"You'd better be, soldier, because my countdown has no abort."

The Task Force 141 continued throughout the complex, fighting Covenant troops wherever they saw them. Then they saw something that they immediately recognized: a bunch of over-sized Huey helicopters.

"Ramius, those for us?" Weaver asked.

"Who else are they for?" Ramius replied, climbing in one Huey. The 141 hastily scrambled onboard the choppers, taking to the skies to fight the Covenant on their terms. The Marines and Troopers, those that weren't killed, were surprised to see old vehicles be used so efficiently against the Covenant. The 141 didn't care; they just wanted to kill off any Covenant son of a bitch they could find, especially Thel Vaddem.

"hey, what's that?" Price asked.

"looks like a rail gun, Price!" Reznov replied.

"put me down there, I'll man it!" Thel yelled. Mason lowered his chopper and the Elite hopped off, climbing inside the gun and blowing away Covenant aircraft. Most of the 141 went on the ground, only those that knew how to fly the Hueys (Mason, Shepherd, Mickey, Ramius, and John-117) stayed in the choppers, providing air support. Soon, all Covenant opposition was gone.

"Six, get to the platform. Captain Keyes' Pelican will soon be arriving." Takeo said. The SPARTAN got to the platform and awaited for the captain to arrive. When he arrived,

"good to see you, SPARTAN. Halsey assured me I could count on you." Captain Jacob Keyes said, taking the package.

"not just me, sir." Richard said, referring to the 141.

"trust me, they'll be remembered. Cruiser! Adjusting heading for the Autumn! Whoever's in that gun, we need fire on that cruiser or we're not getting outta here!"

"I got your back!" Thel yelled over the comm. A Banshee flew overhead and fired it's guns at the troops down below.

"hey Thel, you got an Elite behind you!" Dempsey yelled. Thel Vaddem swung his Energy Sword at the Elite, decapitating it.

"keep these traitors off my back, I'll try and destroy the cruiser!" Thel yelled. After killing all the Covenant troops on the ground, the Arbiter fired several rounds into the belly of the Covenant CCS-class battle cruiser, destroying it. Over the comm,

"this is Captain Keyes of the Pillar of Autumn. We are away, and the package is with us." the cruiser flew away from the doomed shipyard, leaving the Task Force 141 behind.

"alright, let's get the hell off this planet." Kat muttered, breathing heavily.

"Commander Keyes, this is SPARTAN-117. Is this channel secure?"  
>"it is, Chief, go ahead."<p>

"we just gave the package to your father. We're ready for a pick-up, just drop the Morning Sun over here and we'll be on our way."

"little trouble with that, we're in a shoot-out at the moment."

"SAY WHAT?" John yelled. High above in space, the Morning Sun was taking on several Covenant cruisers by itself. The supercarrier was winning, but Miranda was stuck at the moment.

"can you send down some Pelican's at the moment?" John asked.

"no need, look." Richtofen said. The same Pelicans they used to escape Sword Base came back to them, albeit damaged.

"okay, Commander, we got our ride. Prep the bay for us, we'll probably be coming in hot." Carter said. The Pelicans came down and the soldiers walked inside them. Sealing the doors shut, they hit the burners full-throttle and rocketed off Reach toward the Supercarrier, nearly getting shot in the practice.

"Commander, you mind explaining why you're currently in a shoot out with Covie vessels, we're not supposed to be here." John said.

"I had no choice, Chief." Miranda honestly explained. Once the Pelicans were back onboard,

"where to, Chief?" Dempsey asked.

"Cortana, you still have the co-ordinates to the first Halo ring?" John asked.

"yes, and I also still have a copy of the Index, in case you're wondering."

"get us to that ring, now." John sighed. The supercarrier then performed an in-system slipstream jump while still engaged in combat, which had never been attempted before. Thankfully, no Covenant vessels followed them. John removed his helmet and walked to a large cargo room labeled 'classified-Do Not Enter' he entered the correct code on the pad and the doors opened. He walked in and took in his creation.

"too late to drastically change the course of the war, but it'll still be devastating enough." he muttered with a smile.

September 19th, 2552

UNSC Pillar of Autumn

"Cortana, all I need to know, is did we lose them?" Cpt. Keyes asked.

"I think we both know the answer to that." the AI responded.

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

The Supercarrier left slipspace just barely 15 kilometers away from the Autumn. However, the crew weren't preparing the ship for a shootout. Some of them were helping Dr. Brown fix a piece of the Portal Flux Capacitor in the main room. It had taken quite a beating during the Battle of Reach, and they were desperately trying to fix it. The component was raised on jacks, and John was beneath it wearing just his leg armor of his MJOLNIR Mk. VII armor. He was naked from the waist up, and he was now covered in soot and ash. He was busy trying to weld some wiring inside a coupling device, but he had no luck at the moment. Dempsey, Foley, Kat, Carter, Jorge, and Makarov were all about the device, doing whatever they could to fix it, whether it be patching in new wires or welding on pieces of metal. And _Avenged Sevenfold _was blasting on the radio, courtesy to Kat. None of them knew that the engines were still on and that the ship was flying over the cruiser, attracting the attention of both the Covenant and the single human vessel.

"hey John, we got someone on the comm, coming from the Halcyon-class cruiser." Kat said.

"put it on, but try and keep Avenged Sevenfold on as well. Can you do that?" John asked, welding a piece of metal plating onto the device. Kat just snorted as she replied,

"that's like asking if I can scratch my nose."

Captain Keyes' voice came in the room.

"this is Captain Keyes of the Pillar of Autumn, who am I speaking to?"

"hey Keyes, you think you can keep those cruisers off our back, we're busy at the moment. Thank you." John said before cutting the comm. At the moment, the Covenant ships were trying to shoot down the supercarrier, however, the shields protected them. John didn't exactly care about that, he just wanted to finish the war at the moment.

"John, you just told Captain Keyes to shoot at a bunch of Covie cruisers that'll most certainly destroy his ship, while our ship is capable of performing such a feat." Dempsey said.

"alright, set the Wunderwaffe cannons to 'disable' and disable the Covenant ships. I'll be in my quarters. And send the Arbiter down there as well." John said, climbing out from under the PFC. In his quarters,

"you wanted to see me, John?" Thel asked.

"yes. It's about you. You're past self is currently in this enemy fleet, correct?"

"yes, that's true."

"you can't go into that fleet merge with your past self, if you do, the Elites won't break away and we won't win the war. Plain and simple."

"so why order the Wunderwaffe cannon being fired, wouldn't that slow down the Covenant advance on the Ring?"

John hit the intercom button, called the bridge and said,

"whoever's up there, do not fire the Nazi guns, I say again, do not fire those Nazi guns, we need the Covenant ships alive. Put the Pillar of Autumn in the main hanger bay as best as we can and put both ships down on the ring's surface. Everyone, get your guns and armor ready, we're gonna be in a pretty big fight. I want all command officers in my office, immediately." John ordered. Pretty soon, Gen. Hershel von Shepherd III, Cmdr. Carter-259, Cmdr. Miranda Keyes, Arbiter Thel Vaddem, Dr. Edward Richtofen and Dr. Emmett Brown were in John's quarters. Although Richtofen and Brown weren't official command officers, they knew the most about the Morning Sun other than Cortana, so they were next in line to command the ship after the Arbiter.

"alright people, listen up. We're gonna put the Pillar of Autumn down on the ring, so I want the entire 141 ready for combat. Tell Johnson once the airlocks are connected, he's to find his past self and merge with himself immediately. Carter, tell Emile and Richard to go with him, so no-one messes with him."  
>"how are we gonna break all this to my father, he'll want to know to everything. Especially why you're on the Autumn <em>and<em> the Morning Sun at the same time." Miranda asked.

"I'll figure something out. I'd imagine that Cpt. Keyes is wondering why we're not responding to his hails."

"I'll take care of it." Carter said, leaving the room. Suddenly, a thought came to John's head.

"I'm sorry, but I'm gonna need everyone except Shepherd to leave the room."

It was an odd order, but everyone except Shepherd left. As Brown and Richtofen left,

"Brown, Richtofen! Run back to the bridge and set the Wunderwaffe cannons to 'disable', disable those Covie ships." John said.

"yes sir." Brown muttered, wondering what was with the weird orders. When the door closed,

"what's up?" Shepherd asked.

"you know that the majority of the crew is fielded by Innies."

"I know that." Shepherd said, sitting down across the Chief.

"You know, you look a lot like Dr. Daniel Shepherd."

"who?"  
>John turned the computer screen on his desk to reveal a somewhat-elderly man with a dark stare, wearing UNSC Marine BDU's and a Beret.<p>

"Dr. Daniel Shepherd, a Insurrectionist scientist. Creates bio-chemical weapons of mass destruction. A malignant narcissist, degenerate prodigy. Very sadistic, considers his soldiers to be expendable. Doesn't really care much about his own life as well. He's had 16 assassination attempts on him, and he's survived them all."

"and you're telling me this, why?"  
>"what I'm gonna tell you next is strictly between us, and us alone. Over the course of the war, I built a gas weapon to use against the Covenant. It took me forever to do so, but it's a fully working weapon. My plan is simple: You're gonna pose as an Insurrectionist scientist, who commanded an Innie frigate. You built the gas weapon to use against the UNSC, but your ship crash-landed on the ring, and you're stuck here. You then contacted me and decided to defect to the UNSC and give us the weapon, in exchange for immunity and protection. That's the plan."<p>

"where the hell are we gonna get a frigate?" Shepherd asked.

"remember all those frigates we found? I didn't take all of them apart. One of them is still in one piece, and that's where the gas weapon is. I've already sent down over 2,000 crewmembers. They're orders are to follow your orders. For all they know, you're Daniel Shepherd. They believe that the doctor was already onboard the ship, but never made an appearance. So, change your uniform, grab a rifle, and get down to the frigate."  
>"how are we gonna put the frigate down without attracting attention?"<p>

"I'll set off a blast from the cannons, make it appear the ship had an energy discharge. When that exact moment happens, I want you jump that frigate out from the supercarrier onto the surface of Halo. At these co-ordinates. Try and make the landing look extremely sloppy, so the ship looks like it was damaged. I'll try and get Captain Keyes to approve of a strike force to get to the frigate and get the weapon."

"why do all this?"

"to try and distract the Covenant, try and turn this battle on our side before it gets worse." John said, mostly to himself. Shepherd left his office and headed down to the frigate.

"hey, Cortana?" John asked. Cortana then appeared on the holoprojector.

"what's up?"  
>"can you send an energy discharge from the ship, more specifically, the Nazi guns?"<br>"do we have any dead bodies onboard?"  
>"not that I know of."<p>

"I can do that, easily. Why do you ask?"  
>"I wanna see if that'll distract the Covenant for us while their ships are adrift."<p>

As the Rise of the Morning Sun flew down to the ring's surface with the Pillar of Autumn in tow, a massive energy discharge emanated from the bay of the ship. At that exact moment, the captured frigate jumped away from the supercarrier and crash-landed on the ring, in a large snowy mountainous region. John grabbed his helmet and Cortana, and went to the airlock holding the Autumn and the Morning Sun together. Along with him was Miranda Keyes, Avery Johnson, Emile, Jorge, and Foley. They passed through the airlock and walked down the hallways of the Autumn, ignoring all the stares of the crewmen. Who could blame them, however, everyone thought that the Master Chief was the last remaining SPARTAN alive. They were wrong, though.

"so where are we going, Chief?" Johnson asked.

"you're gonna find yourself, if you get my drift. Emile, Jorge, go with him."

"I don't need no bodyguard, Chief, I can take care of myself." Johnson argued, his cigar in his mouth.

"and what the hell are you gonna say when everyone sees you merge with your past self?" John smirked.

"you got a point." Johnson sighed. The three soldiers left for Johnson to find himself. Everyone else, however, continued toward the bridge. When they got there, the guards stopped them.

"either you let me in, or I'll rip your jaw off." John threatened. The guards quickly opened the door.

"you always find new ways to motivate people, Chief." Miranda smirked.

"are you talking about when we assaulted that ice planet to destroy a Covenant AA gun, and I told a marine that if he didn't move his ass, I'd rip his arms off?"  
>"that, and plenty of other moments, John." Foley said, scratching his hair. The door opened, and the three soldiers walked straight into the bridge, catching the attention of everyone at the bridge. Captain Keyes was staring right at his daughter, he thought she was stationed at Earth. But that didn't matter at the moment, she was here, and that was what mattered. But one of the things that he couldn't get his head around was the SPARTAN. The being looked exactly like the Master Chief, hell, he even had the numbers '117' etched on his armor. But the only SPARTAN labeled as '117' was standing right in the bridge. The new SPARTAN wore armor that looked extremely advanced, menacing as hell, and must've gone through pure hell and back to look this beat up. The new SPARTAN just walked past Cpt. Keyes, grabbed the data-chip out of his helmet, put it in the computer, removed his helmet, and stared at the other SPARTAN. The younger John-117 asked,<p>

"is this some sort of a trick?"

The other John-117 then replied,

"no trick. I promise you it's real, Johnny boy." John smiled, causing some crewmembers to look at him; they rarely seen a SPARTAN smile, let alone one with his helmet off. John then grabbed the younger SPARTAN on the neck and merged with is past self.

"what the hell was that?" Jacob asked.

"hey Cortana, you find yourself?" John asked. All the consoles in the bridge briefly glowed a bright white, then faded back to their original colors. Cortana then appeared on the holo-tank, although extremely different looking. She had blond hair, blue eyes, a fair complexion, and 100% naked. No computer calculations or anything to cover herself. 4th base, nude. As such, everyone male human on the bridge was staring at her with wide eyes, especially John-117.

"uh, did you just make this change barely, or were you planning it for a long time?" John asked slowly, as he felt his pants grow rather tight.

"I've been planning it for a while, but the holo-projectors on the Morning Sun were damaged during the attack on Cyrus III back in '39. And you never bothered to fix them."

"uh, I was actually expecting a date or something."

"about 5 hours after the 115 worked it's magic on you. The following day, actually." Cortana smirked. John remembered that very well; the 115 brought his sex drive back, so he had a wet dream with Cortana in it. He could only guess that Cortana hacked into his memories and found out about it, and decided to change her form to see the Chief's reaction. John made a mental note to himself to talk to Cortana about changing back to her original self.

"right. Um, you wouldn't happen to know where Johnson is, would you?" John asked. Just then, Woods popped in.

"hey Chief, we got a problem down in the hanger deck, Johnson found his past self but he got into a…whoa, who's the naked chick?" Woods said after getting a good look at Cortana.

"who do you think, smartass?" Cortana replied.

"alright, look. You obviously have a lot of questions you need to answer." Jacob stated.

"and they'll be answered in due time, but right now, we need to get this ship on that ring." John said, lighting a cigarette and drinking from his flask, surprising Cpt. Keyes and everyone else in the bridge. The entire 141, however, knew he was a smoker and an alcoholic, even Cortana, even though she tried to get him to quit. Here are all the smokers and alcoholics in the 141:

Dr. Emmett Brown-alcoholic, scotch

Vladimir Makarov-alcoholic, scotch

Nikolai Belinsky-alcoholic, vodka

Cpl. Michael Crespo-alcoholic, beer

John-117-alcoholic, smoker, vodka and cigarettes

Gen. Shepherd-smoker, cigars

Fidel Castro-smoker, cigars

Mjr. John MacTavish-smoker, cigars

Cpt. John Price-smoker, cigars

Jun-266-smoker, cigarettes

Sgt. Roebuck-smoker, cigarettes

Cpl. Taylor H. Miles-smoker, cigarettes

"and why would we do that?" Keyes asked.

"weren't you just about to put the Autumn down on the ring before my supercarrier picked you up?" John replied with a smirk.

"your supercarrier, what-we're gonna have a long talk once everything is set in order." Keyes glared angrily. John, however, kept his cool.

"I look forward to it, captain. Hey Woods, you said something about Johnson, he's in trouble?" John asked coolly.

"um, I think it's best if I show you." Woods said as he watched John grab Cortana and put her in his helmet.

"I should probably go with them." Miranda said, following the two US Marines and the SPARTAN.

"so, what happened to Johnson?" Miranda asked as they followed Woods to the hanger bay

"well, he walks right into the hanger bay, and the two spot each other. The past Johnson thinks that our Johnson; he thinks it's all some sort of Covenant trap. So he opened fire on our Johnson."

"alright, I'll take care of it." John said, walking into the hanger.

"I'm surprised Noble Team didn't do the same when they saw us down in the cave." Cortana said.

"we probably would've killed them all if they shot at us." John said.

"you know, you've become rather cynical, you know that?"

"30 years of nonstop fighting behind enemy lines will turn any man cynical. Okay, I'm going headless now." John said, taking his helmet off. He saw the past Johnson in old Marine BDU's firing an MA5B assault rifle.

"Sgt., stand down!" John yelled.

"yeah right, Chief! Let me take care of him!" Johnson yelled. John lit another stogie and tossed Johnson his near empty flask.

"drink up, you deserve it." John said.

"since when do SPARTAN's drink and smoke?" Johnson growled. John reached down and grabbed the present Johnson, and chucked him at the past Johnson. The two Avery Johnson's merged, although Johnson wasn't happy.

"you throw harder then a zombie punches, you know that?" Johnson yelled.

"wow, zombies must really punch hard." John said sarcastically, putting his helmet back on.

"Sierra-117, this is Cpt. Keyes, what's going on down there?" Keyes asked.

"nothing you need to know, captain." John said rather snarky.

"so, what do we do now, Chief?" Johnson asked.

"get this hunk-a-junk on the planet, move everything and everyone off this ship and into our ship, and destroy the ring. But I got some exploring to do first." the Master Chief said.

"hey John, we got a problem with the engines." Brown said over the comm.

"what's wrong?" John sighed.

"well, the Autumn is somehow slaving off our sync-coils in the main reactor. At the current rate, the engines will conk out in five minutes and we'll crash on the ring."

"alright. Cortana, can you disable the Autumn's engines?" John said, sliding the data chip into a computer console.

"that's easy. Just wait a few seconds…." Cortana mulled.

The ship then shook as the engines went down.

"alright. Hey Brown, you, Cortana and I are gonna have a little chat with Captain Keyes." John said. Everyone was wondering how that little meeting was gonna go down.

* * *

><p><strong>Read and review, please! If anyone thinks I need any help trying to keep the characters OC or trying to keep the story-line accurate, please do so! no flames, please!<strong>


	5. Chapter 4

**I own nothing except the Morning Sun, Dr Brown, and the DG weapons four through ten, along with the Wunderwaffe Cannons. Everything else belongs to Microsoft, Bungie, 343 Industries, Infinity Ward, and Activision. Here's the next chapter, enjoy!**

* * *

><p>Chapter 4<p>

"so, in the future, we won the war, you made it back to Earth, befriended a physics scientist, went back in time to certain points of time in Earth's past, abducted several soldiers to create a Black Operations military squadron, inexplicably started the Human-Covenant War, and have been fighting the Covenant behind enemy lines for the entirety of the war until Reach, when you made yourselves known to UNSC personnel?" Keyes summed it all up.

"basically, that's what we did." John said.

"and said scientist made use of a UNSC Supercarrier, turned it into a time machine, and then you armed with enough weapons to destroy Earth's defenses?"

"yup."

"and he also managed to bring Cortana to metastability, she can live forever unless she's destroyed?"

"she's the ship A.I. for the _Morning Sun_, no way in hell she'll be destroyed. And yes, she's metastable." John said with a smirk.

"alright, now that everything's in order-"

"captain, I have a proposition for you. And you might wanna activate the comm system on a frequency of HK-41C and channel it into this room." John said, smiling.

"why?"

"you'll see." John said. Pretty soon, a radio message came over the speakers.

"…._this is Dr. Danny Shepherd calling the super soldier known as Sierra-117. Sierra 117, come in, this is Danny Shepherd. I have the package, I repeat, I have the package. If you're hearing this, respond immediately._"

"who's Danny Shepherd, and why is he personally calling you?" Keyes asked.

"Danny Shepherd is a Insurrectionist biochemical scientist. He contacted me several months ago and struck a deal with me: he would give me his weapon that he created and I would be allowed to use it against the Covenant. And in exchange, I would grant him full protection and immunity within the UNSC."

"you what?" Keyes asked, shocked.

"he says the weapon he has is very powerful, and could be a game-changer for the war, tip the tables for humanity." John said. Keyes mulled it over. He wasn't fond of the Insurrectionists, but if what John-117 said was true, then they needed everything they had at their fingertips to make sure they survived the war.

"alright, I'll organize a strike force to retrieve this weapon of his."

"if it's alright with you, captain, I'd like my squad to come with us." John said.

"I guess we could use the extra hands. I'll get Mjr. Silva and Lt. McKay to co-ordinate the ship's marines and ODST's with your squad. I'm probably taking one helluva risk, Master Chief."

"you won't regret it, captain. Trust me." John said with a rather sardonic smile, confusing the naval captain. The two soldiers left the room. John went to find his Task Force, while Cpt. Keyes went to find Mjr. Silva. Silva was at the armory with several ODST's.

"Major Silva!" Keyes barked.

"Sir." the ODST replied, snapping into a salute.

"get your men together, you're going on a little field trip." Keyes said.

"what sort of field trip, sir?" Silva asked.

"just get your men together, we'll debrief you and your men very soon. Be at the conference room in 2 hours." Keyes said, leaving the ODST confused.

"what was all that about?" McKay asked.

"I don't know." Silva said, grabbing his MA5B rifle. Two hours later, Silva, McKay, Gunnery Sergeant Pete Stacker, and several other marines and ODST's were in the conference room with the Task Force 141. It was, however, split up. The entire 141 were standing or sitting down on the left side of the table, and Silva's Marines were sitting or standing on the other side. The room felt rather cramped because there were 7 SPARTAN super-soldiers inside the room. Silva glared at them, especially John-117, with suppressed anger. What he couldn't understand, however, was what were Cpt. Dare's ODST's doing with SPARTAN's. What confused everyone even more, however, was the fact that said SPARTAN's and ODST's were mingling with each other extremely casually, almost as if they were all good friends. Everyone thought ODST's and SPARTAN's hated each other, and part of Silva wanted it that way. But he didn't want to piss the SPARTAN's off, especially when he got a good look at their armor. Everyone also wondered what was with all the soldiers in the squad, almost all of them were wearing uniforms and BDU's from either World War II, Vietnam, or World War III. A small section of them, however, wore what appeared to be business suits augmented to hold ammunition. They didn't know how well skilled those men were in combat. Captain Keyes then walked in and dimmed the lights.

"alright, I'm gonna keep this briefing short and quick to the point. Most, if not all of you know, that the UNSC Supercarrier _Rise of the Morning Sun_ has managed to disable the Covenant armada orbiting this ring-world. Seeing as the supercarrier doesn't have a set CO, I'll be taking command of the Supercarrier. Starting tomorrow morning at 0600 hours, all the weapons, materials, supplies, etc will be removed from the _Pillar of Autumn_ to the _Morning Sun_. we'll be abandoning this ship for the carrier. But we have other matters at hand. Master Chief?" Keyes asked, motioning for John to step forward.

"alright. I'll keep this short and brief. An Insurrectionist-controlled frigate has crash-landed on this ring in this sector, Bravo-G11." John said, turning on the holo-screen on the wall to reveal plains and rocky hills and mountains covered in ice and snow. It also showed a badly damaged UNSC frigate.

"the commanding officer of said frigate, a Dr. Daniel Shepherd, has contacted me and requested the assistance of the Pillar of Autumn's crew to retrieve a weapon hidden inside the ship, bring it back to the Morning Sun, and leave this ring-world to prevent it from falling into enemy hands. I have already made an agreement with him that if we can use his weapon against the Covenant, that he would be granted immunity from the Insurrectionist movement."

"look, this is all well and good, but what does this have to do with my men?" Silva asked.

"I thought I made it clear. Yourself and your ODST's will be supplementing my squad in the main attack on the frigate to retrieve the weapon."

"oh, so we're gonna be helping Section III freaks now? Captain, you can't let…him…..do this, my men can retrieve this weapon by ourselves."

"Major Silva, you're concerns have been duly noted, but I will say this, you will supplement the SPARTAN's squad, is that clear?"  
>"no, that's not clear! My ODST's can pull this off by ourselves, we don't need any inhumane cyborg to help us!" Silva yelled. The words stung the SPARTAN's, but they showed no sign of it.<p>

"MAJOR SILVA, YOU WILL STOW THAT-"

"IT'S PERFECTLY ALRIGHT, CAPTAIN!" John raised his voice, silencing the two feuding officers.

"if I could send you and your ODST's to retrieve the weapon, I would gladly let you do it. But Dr. Shepherd has asked for _me_, and he will be expecting _me_. What could you do in that situation?" John asked, silencing the ODST.

"alright, I've granted the Master Chief temporary command in this mission, he will be the commanding officer."

"WHAT?" Silva yelled, which was more like a shriek.

"MJR. SILVA!" Keyes barked.

"calm yourself down, or I'll personally see to it that you'll be dishonorably discharged from the UNSC." Keyes said in a dangerous tone. Silva sat down, defeated.

"If there aren't anymore interruptions, this meeting is adjourned. I suggest that everyone get ready for the attack, it'll begin in 3 hours." John said, leaving the room. Everyone slowly began to leave the room as well. Veronica grabbed Silva by the arm and held him tightly.

"take it from an ODST who fought with the Chief for three decades. You want to get on his good side; follow his orders and watch his back." Veronica said in a tone that Silva couldn't tell if she was simply playing with him or if she was threatening him. The look in her eyes, however, told Silva that she wanted to kill him, and seeing that her right hand was next to her pistol proved that.

"what was all that about?" Buck asked as the left the room.

"remind me to kill that son of a bitch later." Veronica whispered as they walked down the hall. Everyone on the Autumn went to the Autumn's main armory to get ready for the mission. The 141, however, went back to the supercarrier; all their equipment and weapons were on that ship. 3 hours later, a squadron of Arctic Warthogs and several flatbed trucks were in position.

"alright, one thing for those who weren't at the meeting. And technically, this goes for everyone. We are looking for one Innie, and one Innie only. Dr. Daniel Shepherd. He's not to be harmed; he offered his cooperation to us to help humanity win the war. Disobey this order, I'll shoot you personally. Now get going, we're wasting time." John said. No one knew if what he meant was true or not, but they didn't want to test him.

"what you said, was that true, shooting anyone who harms Shepherd?" Cortana asked.

"not really, I just said that to scare them. I just hope that Shepherd sticks with the plan." John said. The Warthogs turned on and they were off to retrieve Shepherd's weapon. In one of the Warthogs, Dimitri Petrenko, Chernov and Viktor Reznov were talking.

"Silva seemed pretty angry at the Chief. I would think that he'd be happy to have a SPARTAN lead the charge." Chernov said at the wheel.

"remind me to talk to Silva once we get back, I'll find out why he hates John so much." Reznov said riding shotgun.

"head's up, he's right behind us." Petrenko muttered, drinking Gatorade from his flask while trying not to fall off from the turret. The Warthogs continued driving to the frigate. It soon came in sight, and so did the opposing mortar rounds. Everyone quickly abandoned their Warthogs and began attacking the frigate. Which was heavily defended with Innie troops. The SPARTAN's easily broke through them, however.

"I'm not a big fan of the SPARTAN's, but they're great help in a fight." Silva said to McKay. Personally, McKay didn't care about that, she just wanted to get the weapon and get the hell outta there. The fighting soon turned into a stalemate, neither side could advance. So Roebuck came up with a quick plan.

"Polonsky, Miller, you're with me. We're flank these bastards and get us closer to the frigate." the American sergeant explained. They quickly executed their plan.

"you like that, you piece of shit?" Polonsky yelled, firing his BR55 battle rifle into the Insurrectionists, bringing them down. His regular M1 Garand rifle was on his back.

"keep moving!" John yelled once he saw the three Americans break the stalemate. They soon got to the frigate.

"McKay! Silva! Take five men and storm the frigate, find where Dr. Shepherd hides! Grab him and bring him to me! No injuries!" John yelled. The ODST's ran throughout the wreckage of the frigate and soon found their target: Dr. Daniel Shepherd, who was actually General Hershel von Shepherd in disguise. He was in what appeared to be an officer's quarters, with several burning candles for light with papers all over the place.

"don't point that rifle at me, UNSC pig!" Shepherd yelled, flicking his cigar away. He pulled up his M4A1 rifle and rested it on his lap.

"you're gonna take me to the SPARTAN known as Sierra-117. Is that clear?" he smiled.

"get over here, you piece of shit." Silva snarled, grabbing Shepherd and roughly pushing him down the halls. When they got outside, they saw Veronica executing several Insurrectionist with her pistol. Silva and McKay were disgusted at that sight, but Shepherd and the rest of the 141 paid no mind.

"what the hell went wrong, Dr., I thought I agreed to no resistance." John asked. He was with Carter, Kat, Dutch, and Kennedy. They were discussing the possibilities of what might be inside the frigate.

"you really think I can control all these men, they're fanatics! Hell, they've all sworn to defend the Insurrectionist movement to their last breath." Shepherd said.

"that's rather honorable, but incredibly stupid in the long run." Kat said.

"Silva, take point. Veronica, finish up here!" John yelled. The ODST captain slit the throat of the last Innie prisoner with her knife, flicking the blood off on the white snow.

"hey Dr., you mind telling us what your weapon is?" Kennedy asked, slinging his modified China Lake grenade launcher.

"back in '42, all the major Insurrectionist movements realized that regular terrorist attacks wouldn't work on the UNSC. So we began looking for more unconventional solutions. I was a biochemical engineer, I knew my talents could greatly help the movement. However, I realized that the Covenant were a greater threat to us then the UNSC. So I contacted Sierra-117 and we made a deal."

"you still haven't told us what your weapon is." Veronica said.

"I started building a gas weapon unlike any other that has been seen by human eyes. It was frustrating work, failure after failure. But two weeks ago, I achieved success on my project; this weapon was rather deadly and extremely dangerous." Shepherd said. Silva opened yet another hatch and they found themselves in what appeared to be a nuclear-missile launch pad of some sort. It looked to be badly mangled and unusable.

"you're weapon may be very deadly, but you still had to find a way to actually unleash it." Kat said.

"modified Shiva missiles designed to carry the gas instead of a nuclear warhead. Our target was to be Earth, show the UNSC that we really meant business."

"I like your ambition and your courage, Dr. You gotta have big balls to attack Earth." John said.

"but the crew found out of my contacting you, SPARTAN. They disabled the slipstream drive and my frigate crashed here on this ring world. They were gonna kill me, but they realized that the frigate could never fly again. And once they got word you guys were coming, they decided to make a stand. See how that worked out for them?" Shepherd smirked. Carter and Kat looked at each other and chuckled.

"how far is it?" McKay asked.

"not too far. Just through that hatch and we'll have the weapon." Shepherd said.

"Silva, open the door." John said. Silva sighed and opened the partially frozen hatch. They entered the room and found what appeared to be a testing area. There were two rooms with bulletproof windows and hatches. In the middle of the room stood a massive canister with a Nazi swastika on the front of it with the words 'Nova 6' painted on the front.

"I was a fan of the Nazi's, believe it or not." Shepherd said. Whether that was his cover line or if Gen. Shepherd really was a fan of the Nazi's, no one knew. John had a sadistic smile on his face as he removed his helmet, tucking it beneath his arm face forward so Cortana could see.

"alright. Grab Silva and his ODST's and throw 'em in those cages." John ordered his squad. Reluctantly, they did so. The TF-141 learned long ago not to disobey John-117's orders.

"what the hell are you doing?" Silva yelled. Silva, McKay, and their ODST's were thrown inside the cages and locked inside. John walked forward to the computer console in between the two rooms and pressed several commands. Light green misty gas gently floated inside the cages and worked their magic on the captives. The ODST's made a mistake removing their helmets. Their skin turned a sick, scaly black. They began vomiting rather violently, the captives' eyes then began bleeding, slightly blinding them. They also began coughing up blood, lots of it. Also, their bodies seemed to get smaller; they were slowly being melted. John had the Nova 6 weapon combined with an acidic gas molecule, made it extremely dangerous for anyone not wearing a mask. It was a horrible and disgusting sight to see. Silva raised his gun and fired at the glass, but that didn't do anything. He stumbled forward and began banging his fist against the glass in a pathetic attempt to free himself. But in his extremely weakened state, escape was impossible. The trapped ODST's soon died in the cages. Everyone who was outside stared at their disfigured bodies with complete shock and horror. John was staring at their bodies with a malevolent smile.

"man, this thing works better then I thought it would be; far beyond my most optimistic projections. Alright, let's disconnect it, get it to the trucks, haul ass back to the Morning Sun." John said extremely causally. He wasn't bothered by the fact that he just killed several ODST's in a brutal manner. The rest of the 141 never knew that he could be so brutal and violent. Not even Richtofen, Makarov, Emile, Ghost, MacTavish, Kat, and Chernov would be that sadistic. And those seven have been reported to be extremely brutal to POW's, whether they be human or Covenant. As the Nova 6 gas weapon was transported back to the Morning Sun, everyone wondered how they would break the news to Cpt. Keyes. John, however, had already contacted him and told them that Silva, McKay and their ODST's wouldn't be coming back, the Innies killed them.

"I never knew John could be that brutal." Carter said.

"30 years of nonstop fighting will do that to any man." Makarov said, drinking his scotch.

"are you actually defending that psycho?" Emile asked, surprised at what Makarov said.

"I'm not. I'm just saying, he's probably really fucked up in the head from what the war's done to him. Hell, we're probably all messed up in the head, he's just decided to let it out." Makarov said, downing his scotch. When they got back to the Pillar of Autumn, Cpt. Keyes was outside to greet them.

"we got bad news. The Covenant ships up in orbit, they've regained their power and are sending down troops. And Dr. Brown just informed me that the Morning Sun can't go and destroy the cruisers outright, that blast from the Wunderwaffe cannons, as he called them, drained the power considerably. We're currently moving all the personal and equipment from the Autumn to the Morning Sun. We're also gonna use the Morning Sun to defend this position from the Covenant. So get your weapon loaded up and help the crew." Keyes said, then he got back inside the Pillar of Autumn.

"you heard the man, get this weapon loaded up." John said. John's Nova 6 weapon was then loaded in the Rise of the Morning Sun's main cargo bay. They all had to forget what John had just done to Silva and his men and prepare for battle against the Covenant. Cortana, however, had the luxury of remembering because she wasn't exactly a soldier. As John put the data-chip back into his head, he braced for whatever Cortana would throw at him. "WHAT THE HELL WAS ALL THAT ABOUT BACK THERE? HOW LONG WERE YOU PLANNING ON KILLING SILVA AND HIS MEN? NO, A BETTER QUESTION IS, HOW LONG DID YOU HAVE THAT GAS WEAPON ONBOARD THE SHIP, AND WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ANYONE ELSE ABOUT IT?" Cortana shrieked angrily into the SPARTAN's ears.

"Cortana, I've already got major tinnitus from 30 years of fighting, so I would really appreciate it if you wouldn't scream at me." John sarcastically said. He was actually expecting Cortana to be pissed at him.

"I still wanna know why you never told me anything." she demanded.

"it was an experiment, I wasn't even sure if it would even work. I built it so I could use it against the Flood, so I wouldn't leave you behind on High Charity again." John said truthfully. That was the whole reason why he built the weapon. Cortana was silenced by that.

"then why'd you kill Silva and McKay?" she asked, her tone no longer pissed off.

"they were right there, I needed some test subjects to see how it would work. There was no way I'd use the one-four-one; but Silva and McKay are expendable. Were expendable, I should say." John said casually, then he immediately regretted saying it.

"so instead of holding off using the weapon against the Flood, you decided to murder some UNSC officers, one of them who held a grudge against the SPARTAN program." Cortana said bitterly.

"I'm not gonna argue with you on this one, Cortana. I thought what I did was right, and if I could do it again, I definitely would." John said. Cortana sighed; sometimes she wished she was paired with a different SPARTAN. John slammed a fresh clip into his assault rifle, hopped in a Warthog and began driving away from the supercarrier.

"where are you going?" Cortana asked.

"Brown said a while back that we can change time, but it would have to be small changes, like keeping Cpt. Keyes and Noble Team alive. And I remembered, the only way to actually win the war is if we have the Flood unleashed. Especially on this ring, we'll need 343 Guilty Spark's help to win the war." John said.

"and you aren't gonna tell everyone else about your plan?" Cortana asked.

"it's just you and me." John said, flooring the Warthog. Back at the supercarrier,

"hey, did anyone see where John and Cortana went?" Carter asked.

"hey, if we can get rid of that psycho, the better." Roebuck said, helping Sgt. Pete Stacker move a weapon crate into a Warthog. This was probably the first time the 141 were beginning to think of John-117 as a psycho, instead of a steadfast leader who got them through hell and back that no man or woman should ever imagine. John-117 and Cortana continued to drive away from the Morning Sun to the Silent Cartographer. It was there that they would find the Control Room. But first, they had to use the SC to find a Flood Containment Room, unleash the Flood, get 343 Guilty Spark all riled up, steal the Index, leave the Ring, and detonate the Autumn's reactor to blast it to pieces. So much easier said then done. Night soon fell; the skies were filled with bright stars against a black background. John and Cortana soon found what they were looking for: the Silent Cartographer. John armed himself with two M7 subs, two M6 Magnums, an MA5C rifle, a M45 shotgun, a BRHBB5 battle rifle, two RPG-7's, and two Thompson submachine guns with the stocks removed. He also had plenty of grenades magnetically attached to his arms and legs.

"you plan on fighting the entire Covenant army by yourself?" Cortana joked.

"never hurts to be prepared." John said, cocking his assault rifle. He slowly walked inside the building. No resistance, yet, that is.

"Cortana, help me out. You remember this place?" John asked.

"keep going down this hall, and then take a left. Should lead you to the map." Cortana replied. When they got there,

"alright, let's see where we are, shall we?" John muttered, plugging Cortana in. Cortana appeared on the holo-projector.

"so, where's the Flood Containment room?" John asked.

A large map of the Halo ring was pulled up.

"right here."  
>"okay then, I bust in, release the flood, get a bunch of people infected, find the monitor, steal the index, blow up the ring, and win the war." John said.<p>

"you make it sound easy when you say it like that." Cortana joked.

"easier said then done. Can you use the teleporters to get me to the containment room?" John asked, putting his MA5C away and pulling out his Tommy-Guns.

"I think I can."

"good. I'll see you later." John said. Light surrounded the SPARTAN and he felt himself being teleported away. He found himself in a Flood Containment Room.

"I'm gonna enjoy this." John smiled behind the helmet. He raised the submachine guns and opened fire. Tanks filled with Infection Forms suddenly burst open. Sentinels responded to the threat and were quickly gunned down by the maniacal SPARTAN. After about 3 minutes, the room was slowly being filled by Flood Forms.

"I'm out." John muttered, quickly running away.

"Cortana, the trap has been set, I repeat, the trap has been set. Anything on the comms?" John asked.

"nothing yet. Wait, the Covenant ships up in orbit have regained their power and are sending troops down. Most of them are going to the _Morning Sun_."

"can you hook me up to the Covenant Comm array?"  
>"why?"<br>"I wanna make the Flood Threat more urgent." John said.

Cortana just rolled her eyes, but did as she was asked. Once he got a secure line,

"hey Covenant ass-holes! It's me, the Demon! I've personally destroyed more ships and killed more Elites then I can remember! Here I am, on your holy ring world you call Halo, and you still haven't killed me! I'll be waiting for you, if you guys aren't cowardly enough to try and kill me!" John yelled.

"that oughta get their attention. Nice work, by the way, I never knew you had that in you."

"thanks. It's just something made up at the moment. How close are they?" John asked. Suddenly, several Covenant drop-pods slammed around him.

"that close." Cortana smirked.

"call me back in 15 minutes, I'm a little busy at the moment." John said, switching the comm off. He raised the Tommy Guns and sprayed several Grunts with lead, effectively turning their alien heads into mush. An Elite with an energy sword charged forward. John quickly holstered the guns, sidestepped the Elite, broke his arm, threw the Elite down, crushed it's head, and slashed several Elites who got too close for comfort. He dropped the sword, grabbed his shotgun and began blasting away at Covenant. He then carelessly threw an armed grenade behind him. It went off, blasting the doors to the containment room open. Flood infection form scurried out. Sierra-117 quickly blasted his way to a Covenant Ghost recon vehicle. He kicked the Grunt off, and slammed on the throttle, piloting him away from the carnage. No doubt the Covenant were soon being assimilated by the Flood.

"where's the Monitor now?" John asked.

"12 klicks south of your current position."

"south. Dammit." John grumbled as he turned the craft around and punched the gas. As the stolen Ghost soared across the plains,

"hey Cortana, can't you simply transport me to the Monitor, it would probably be a lot faster." John smirked.

"the teleporters don't reach to that part of Halo."

"you're kidding me. Well, I'll need something faster." John sighed. He saw a Banshee swoop down with its cannons firing at the SPARTAN. John jumped up, grabbed the Banshee, kicked the pilot out of the cockpit and flew it towards the Monitor.

"actually, I was wrong. The Monitor's coming to you."

"I can wait." John sighed in frustration. Sentinels began appearing to take care of the Flood, problem was, the Flood was too great. 343 Guilty Spark soon appeared on the scene and found John in the center of it all.

"ah, Reclaimer. I see you're hard at work."

"get me outta here!" John yelled. John felt the Forerunner teleporter take him and the Forerunner A.I. away from the battlefield and placed him deep into the heart of the Halo ring.

"where are we?" John asked.

"I'm surprised you don't know. We are near the Index Control Room in the Library. I'm afraid that retrieving the Index, however, will be much more difficult then I originally planned. The Flood are spreading, drastically, I'm afraid. Much more quickly then I originally thought. You must have been preparing for this by the amount of weapons you have on, Reclaimer. Unfortunate, though, your weapons, while numerous, aren't exactly perfectly suited for fighting the Flood. Your combat skin, however, is….. I'm sorry, I must've overlooked my scans. Your combat skin is rated class seven. Not meant for work against the Flood, but still very impressive. These Sentinels, however, will still help you." the Forerunner A.I said. True to his word, Sentinels began appearing out of nowhere.

"now begins the hard part." John sighed, cocking his battle rifle. Suddenly, Flood infection forms and Flood Combat Forms began appearing from down the hall.

"son of a bitch." John muttered, opening fire with his rifle and cursing himself for not bringing some Nazi DG weapons, they would greatly help him. After the Flood was taken care of,

"this way, Reclaimer." Guilty Spark said, motioning towards the door. After tinkering with the controls, John walked on the large elevator and waited for the next level. _one down, three to go_….. He thought to himself. The elevator stopped and John found himself fighting more and more Flood.

"how the hell did they get up here so fast, and how did they even multiply so quickly?" John yelled to no-one.

"I'm afraid I don't have all the answers." Spark said apologetically. What surprised John the most was that some of the Flood combat forms were human. A sick thought passed through John's head. Did captain Keyes send some Pelicans after him to see where he went? He pushed that out of his head as he switched the battle rifle for his shotgun and began blasting flood forms apart.

"bring it, freak bags!" John yelled, himself wondering why he suddenly yelled that. _Dempsey must be getting to me, good thing I'm not like Richtofen_…. John thought.

"I'm sorry, what was that?" Guilty Spark asked.

"it's nothing." John muttered, tossing a grenade down the hall, finishing off the last of the Flood.

"excellent! Shall we?" Spark said rather happily, leading the SPARTAN down the hallway to another elevator.

"great, more levels." John sighed. Once again, he had to fight his way through massive amounts of Flood. He still wondered how did the Flood get all the way up here, either another containment room must've been broken into, or the Flood escaped confinement a long time ago. He didn't want to know which was what. John went up to another level which was just crawling with Flood. John had to resort to using the chainsaw and needle weapon on his wrists because he had burned through the ammo so quickly. After dispatching the last of the Flood with his bare hands, he reloaded all his weapons and continued to the next elevator. _last level before the Index_…. John thought. After fighting through more and more Flood,

"you were very wise to bring a large contingent of weapons and ammunition, Reclaimer. Are you sure you haven't done this before?" Spark asked.

"trust me, I do this all the time." John sighed heavily, duel wielding his M7 subs, bringing down several combat forms.

"hmm. Well, now that the Flood has been successfully neutralized, in this part of the Library, however, the Index is now ready for us to retrieve." Spark said with a odd laugh.

"you bet your ass it is." John whispered to himself. When they got to the platform,

"the energy barrier surrounding the Index will deactivate when we reach the ground floor." Spark said, activating the lift and bringing it down to the Index. When the platform came to a stop,

"you may now retrieve the Index." Spark said.

John slowly walked toward the Index. After a few seconds, he gently held the top of the device before slowly pulling it out of the sheath. However, 343 Guilty Spark pulled it out of his hands and into a slot on his body.

"protocol requires that I take possession of the Index for transport. Your organic form renders you vulnerable to infection. The Index must not fall into the hands of the Flood, before we reach the Control Room and activate the installation."

Guilty Spark and John-117 then teleported to the Control Room, which is what John was hoping for. When they got there,

"is something wrong, Reclaimer?" Spark asked.

"no. nothing's wrong." John muttered. When they got to the main control panel,

"unfortunately, my usefulness to this particular endeavor has come to an end. Protocol does not allow units with my classification to... perform a task as important as the reunification of the Index with the Core. That final step is reserved for you, Reclaimer." Spark said. John simply shrugged as he put the Index into the control slot. Instead of the ring activating, Spark just fell on the ground.

"you get the Index, Cortana?" John asked with a smug smile.

"got it right here." a naked Cortana came up, holding the Index with a smirk.

"a construct, in the core? That is absolutely unacceptable!" Spark yelled.

"shit happens, pal. The Index is mine." John said, pulling Cortana out of the console and into his helmet. Spark was too angry for words. He simply said to the Sentinels,

"save his head, destroy the rest." before teleporting away. John raised his M7's and gunned down the Sentinels.

"get us outta here, Chief." Cortana warned.

"I'm on it. Oh, one more thing. I encountered a bunch of human flood forms."

"you don't think the captain-"

"I honestly don't know. I just wanna get the hell back to the Autumn to blow her main reactor." John said, pulling out his assault rifle and blasting his way through the Sentinels.

"Cortana, can you hack the teleporters and get me to the Flood Containment Room?" John asked.

"why would you go there?" Cortana asked.

"we'll probably find a Pelican the captain sent. We can use that to get to the Autumn." John said.

"let me hack into the system." Cortana said. John felt the Forerunner teleporter take him away from the Control Room to the Flood Containment room which was crawling with Flood Combat forms, both human and Covenant. Like John suspected, there were two Pelicans resting in the middle. John hoped that the 141 didn't come in the Pelicans.

"did the 141.…." John asked.

"I don't know, John."  
>"alright, let's just get back to the Autumn." John sighed. John climbed inside one of the Pelicans, powered up the engines and took off toward the downed Halcyon-class cruiser. It was much faster then the Warthog, that was for sure.<p>

"Cortana, hack into the comm, what did captain Keyes use to communicate with this certain Pelican?" John asked.

"I'm sorry Chief, but I can't tell. All the record and data in the computers have been erased."

"by whom?"  
>"I don't know. I honestly don't know." Cortana sighed.<p>

"alright. I got an idea, I'll blast this over the radio." John said. He put in a very small disk in the radio and pressed the 'play' button. _Breaking the Law_ by _Judas Priest_ suddenly came on.

"they'll know who this is. No one else listens to heavy metal from the mid-late 20th century other then the Task Force." John smiled.

"you do realize that the trip to the Autumn from here will far outlast this song?" Cortana reminded the SPARTAN.

"it's a mixed play list; I put a bunch of heavy metal and grunge songs on the disk, they'll know who it is." John smiled. When BtL was finished, _Burden in my Hand _by _Soundgarden_ then blasted on. Pretty soon, the Autumn and the much larger supercarrier Morning Sun was in sight. And they saw something that made John's entire body chill: a massive army of Flood combat forms attacking Pillar of Autumn. Rows of Scorpion tanks, Warthog transports, AIE-486 and M247 heavy machine guns, MG-42 machine guns, massive Browning .50 cal heavy machine guns, and a lot of UNSC Marines were defending the Morning Sun against the massive horde of Flood troops.

"how the hell did they get this far?" John asked.

"I can only guess that we've been in the Library and Control Room longer then we thought."

"that's impossible, we were only there for about 2 hours." John said. Then he stopped; 2 hours would have given the flood enough time to build up a large force to invade the Autumn. But to actually get there….. John put it all out of his mind as he prepared the weapons on the Pelican and blasted _Alive _by _Pearl Jam_. Putting the music as loud as he could get it to, and also blasting it on all the speakers, he dove down and made a strafing run against the undead horde.

"man, I wish I had my Nova 6 with me." John cursed himself.

"…. _unidentified aircraft, please identify yourself._" a man came over the comm.

"this is SPARTAN John-117, I'd advise that everyone pull back and get back to the Morning Sun, I'll take care of the Flood." John said.

"Master Chief, where the hell have you gone and what the hell are you gonna do to take care of these… things, they're practically unstoppable." Captain Keyes replaced the previous man.

"I'm gonna detonate the Pillar of Autumn's main reactors, should create a satisfying boom." John laughed after he said that. He could only picture the look on everyone's face when they heard the SPARTAN's plan.

"YOU'RE GONNA DO WHAT?" Carter screamed in horror.

"you heard me!" John cackled insanely. Richtofen must've been getting to him as well. The Pelican swooped low firing off a deadly barrage of rockets and missiles, blowing the Flood army to pieces.

"well, looks like the captain took your message seriously, he's pulling everyone back to the ship." Cortana said. Waves of Pelicans roared down to grab all the tanks, jeeps, and soldiers from the battle field up to the carrier. When they were all gone,

"alright, now we go detonate it." John said, quickly landing the Pelican in the Autumn's starboard hanger bay. Which was more of a controlled crash-landing.

"nice landing." Cortana joked.

"any landing you walk away from is a good landing. Now let's detonate the reactor before the monitor shows up. Which he probably will, knowing him." John said. Running out of the Pelican, he ran down the bay, through the main door and up to the main bridge. He wasn't the fastest SPARTAN, but with the new armor he and Brown built, he was a lot faster then he used to be. There was only one problem; the whole place was swarming with Sentinels.

"son of a bitch." he muttered. Raising his battle rifle, he opened fire on the Forerunner A.I's, bringing them down quickly.

"if they're here, then that means Guilty Spark must be here as well." Cortana said.

"just my luck." John muttered.

"Master Chief, just what exactly are you planning on doing?" Captain Keyes came over the comm.

"like I said before, detonate the main reactor to destroy this ring. Better get that carrier outta here if you wanna live to see tomorrow morning." John said. That's when 343 Guilty Spark came on.

"why do you continue to fight us, Reclaimer? Just give us the Index and I will endeavor to make your death as quick and painless as possible." the A.I. said.

"fuck you!" John yelled.

"Chief, who was that?" Keyes asked.

"uh, it's nothing you should worry about! Just get that carrier outta here!" John yelled. He forgotten the comm channels was still open so Guilty Spark could communicate with both him and the Morning Sun.

"Chief! Behind you!" Cortana warned. John quickly spun around and brought down several Sentinels.

"Chief, what's going on in there?" Captain Keyes asked. John hastily cut the comm so no one would bother him.

"alright, getting to the bridge is gonna be impossible. Any way we can detonate the reactor from here?" John asked.

"not from here. And besides, we need the captain's recognition codes to detonate the main reactor." Cortana said.

"that's why I brought this." John said, holding up his RPG-7 rocket launcher.

"okay, let's move." Cortana said. John rose up and fired off a quick burst into a Sentinel, destroying it. John decided to make a run for it. He burst through a clot of Sentinels and ran to the main engineering. When he got there, he was out of breath. It wasn't that he was out of shape, it was because he was out of breath, he never ran like that at all.

"okay…., where's the reactor?" John wheezed.

"right there." Cortana said.

"good." John sighed. Aiming the launcher, he pulled the trigger and blew the main reactor to pieces.

"do we have a means of escape?" John sighed.

"there should be a Longsword fighter in Hanger Bay 7. I just hope the carrier left." Cortana said.

"if they have any sense, they will have left when I told them my plan." John said, hopping in a Warthog and slamming on the gas pedal. The sound of rubber squealing across metal vibrated across the ship. John came across hordes of Sentinels, all gunning at him. Suddenly, something came crackling across the radio.

"…..Sierra-117, this is Echo-419. Sierra-117, this is Echo-419, do you copy?" Foehammer's voice came over the radio.

"I copy. Where's the nearest landing pad?" John replied.

"head two kilometers northwest of your current position, I'll pick you up."

"get to it, Chief." Cortana urged.

"I'm on it." John said, flooring the Warthog. When he got to the landing pad, he found Foehammer's Pelican: shot to pieces by Banshees.

"FUCK!" John cursed in anger. He was mad because the sight of all those Banshees meant one thing; the Covenant starships regained their power and were back with a vengeance.

"Foehammer, pull up! Pull up, dammit!" John yelled in his comm. But he heard no response, nothing as the Pelican flew below and exploded.

"Echo-419, this is Master Chief 117, do you copy?" John asked. Nothing.

"fuck! Let's get to that Longsword!" John growled in anger. Once again, John had to burn rubber to make it to the Longsword. And once more, he had to drive his way through dozens of Sentinels.

"how did all these Sentinels make it in, wouldn't the crew have noticed?" Cortana wondered.

"maybe we were stuck out there longer then we thought." John sighed. They finally reached their destination: Hanger 7. Parking the badly damaged Warthog, John hauled ass into the large starfighter, planted his butt in the pilot seat and opened full throttle.

"here we go." he sighed. The belly jets roared to life, pushing the starfighter away from the doomed starship. Soon, he got past Halo's atmosphere and into space. That's when he saw the _Morning Sun_ pulling away from the doomed ring-world as well with all her engines at full power.

"and here we go." John muttered to himself as the reactors on the downed Autumn went off, blowing the ship up and effectively destroying the ring.

"what the hell was that?" Keyes coughed on the comm.

"I just saved our asses back there, that's what was that. Permission to come onboard?" John asked.

"permission granted. And when you get on, you report directly to me, I wanna know what the hell that little stunt was."

"what little stunt?"

"you know what I'm talking about! Stealing a warthog and driving your ass off to god knows where! And you wouldn't happen to know what those…. Things were that attacked us, would you?" Keyes asked.

"I do. I'll explain everything once I'm back onboard. But we got those guys to take care of."

"what guys?"  
>"those guys." John said, referring to the Covenant fleet they previously disabled. Now they were gonna have to shoot their way out. On the bridge,<p>

"go to alert 1!" Brown yelled. The main MAC cannons quickly charged up and sent several slugs of metal at the Covenant warships, quickly destroying or severely damaging several Covenant battle cruisers. The enemy warships returned fire of their own with a wave of Plasma torpedoes. Good thing the shielding held, but only for a small bit. They couldn't sustain a massive barrage of torpedoes for long.

"I'll do what I can from out here, but you guys are gonna have to do the heavy lifting." John said with a smirk.

"get your ass back in here, SPARTAN, we can't afford to lose you!" Shepherd yelled.

"whatever you say, General." John sighed as he piloted the Longsword back into the massive warship. Up in the bridge,

"I want all weapons focused on the lead starship! What do we got on this thing, I'm rather unfamiliar with a UNSC Supercarrier!" Cpt. Keyes yelled.

"Ultra-Carrier, that's the official name of it's class! And I don't think that trying to outshoot the Covenant here is the best choice of action! Lt, take us into Threshold, we're gonna play cat-and-mouse with the Covenant!" Doc Brown yelled. Keyes only stared at him.

"we've done it plenty of times, we got more than enough mines to do so. Although we did use several Shiva warheads as jury-rig mines." Brown muttered.

"alright, it's obvious you know this ship better than I do… alright, it's your's for now." the veteran captain sighed.

"pilot, take us into the center of Threshold. And prep the plasma bombs to detonate. The Covenant are obviously gonna wanna kill us after we destroyed that ring back there, this planet is perfect to test out our new weapons." Brown said.

"what new weapons?" Carter sighed.

"we put in some plasma turrets on the top hull that fire off a pre-set explosive charge, should do wonderful damage to their shields." Richtofen said.

"one question, how long can we stay down here?" Keyes asked.

"uh, with all the electronic interference from the storms, I'd say three hours at most. After that, we risk frying every system on the ship." Brown said.

"so, all we have to do is keep moving in a gas giant while firing our weapons blindly with the hopes we'd destroy the Covenant fleet?" Cortana asked sarcastically.

"you got a better idea?" Brown said. The naked A.I. only smirked as she implemented _her_ plan to destroy the Covenant fleet.

"Cortana, why are you arming all the Shiva's?" Brown asked.

"no reason." she snarked rather evilly as waves of nuclear missiles screamed toward the Covenant fleet. Because all the clouds were blocking the sensors, they didn't see the missiles until it was too late. Nearly all of the Covenant fleet was destroyed in massive nuclear detonations. Only a few select Covenant warships remained, although they didn't survive unscathed. Their commanders, one of them being the future Arbiter, decided to retreat and not suffer the same fate as their fellow brothers in arms. The human warship then came out, her pilots expertly maneuvering the massive starship to avoid the Covenant debris field. One Covenant ship flew into Threshold, but the crew paid them no mind.

"I thought we ran outta nukes." Carter said.

"I lied about our nukes, didn't want to be using a whole truck load just to destroy one Supercarrier. So, what do we do now?" John asked.

"get our house in order. How long will it take to get the proper paperwork filled out to have you as the new commander of the _Morning Sun_?" Brown asked. Keyes would've replied, but was interrupted.

"I'm going down to the armory." John said.

"same here, I wanna see for myself how many nukes we got left." Carter said. As the two SPARTAN's left the bridge,

"well, who was the previous commander?" Keyes asked.

"we never really had one. Well, your daughter was the commanding officer, but she never really went down to the planet surface. Hell, to be honest, I'd have to say the real CO would be John-117; he's gotten us outta more hell and back then any other military officer I've served with." Brown said, drinking some scotch.

"so you think he should be in command, and not a command officer?" Keyes asked.

"I didn't say that. Hell, John kept pushing that your daughter be given command of the ship, and for a while we did. But now that you're here and we got this thing running at full strength now, I feel we'd have a better chance with you at the helm."

"why do you say that?"  
>"don't tell anyone I told you this, but I'm pretty sure the rest of the 141 has noticed as well. For the past couple of weeks, past seven weeks to be exact, he's been locking himself away in his quarters; you know, locking the door, turning the camera's off, he even managed to put in a firewall so not even Cortana could hack into his room. But for all I know, he's doing this because of stress of fighting the war. But I think someone really needs to talk to him, and the squad has already tried that."<p>

"you want me to talk to your CO?" Keyes asked incredulously.

"call me crazy or paranoid, but I have a sick feeling in my gut John's gonna pull something off that could be the death of the entire squad." Brown sighed, leaving the bridge.

* * *

><p><strong>Like? Don't like? Read, review, and leave a comment!<strong>


	6. Chapter 5

**Disclaimer: I don't own Halo or Call of Duty, I only own Dr. Brown, the UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun, the Wunderwaffe Cannons, and the DG weapons. Note: I don't have Halo: First Strike, so if anything in this chapter appears wrong, please notify me so I can fix it. Enjoy!**

* * *

><p>Chapter 5<p>

September [Date unknown], 2552

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

Threshold System, Remains of [Forerunner Halo ring, Installation 04] Unidentified Alien Object

"any idea as to how the Flood got in so great numbers and attacked the Autumn in two hours, Cortana?" Captain Keyes asked.

"I honestly have no idea, sir. I can only guess that the Flood took their time and gathered in strength while the Chief and I were away."

"and that's another thing, what the hell were you two doing out there, did you unleash all the Flood on us?" Keyes asked. Cortana wasn't happy.

"I honestly can't believe you'd even ask me that. No, the Chief and I didn't unleash the Flood on the Autumn. We can't exactly explain our actions; all I can say is that we were helping out to win the war in a rather unconventional manner. I can't say anything else because I don't exactly have all the answers for you." Cortana said. That was a lie; she did have the answer, but to try and explain it to the captain who was still reeling from the shock that John and Cortana traveled back in time and started the war, that would be impossible.

"people, I have good news and bad news." Doc Brown walked into the bridge.

"what's the good news?" Dempsey asked, wiping down his B.A.R.

"the good news is I think I may have found out how the Flood were able to mass in large numbers to attack us. The bad news is that you won't like the good news."  
>"just tell us." John sighed angrily.<p>

"alright. The Portal Flux Capacitor, it started acting up once we touched down on the Halo ring, while the Autumn was still in our hanger deck. Somehow, the combination of the Autumn slaving off power from our engine sync coils and Halo's backup reactor activating once it tapped into another Forerunner artifact managed to send a massive electrical feedback to the PFC, causing it to go hay-wire. This ship, the crew, even John and Cortana have all been traveling back and forth through time. I haven't been able to pinpoint exactly how far we've been traveling, but I'd put it between 2 hours and 5 weeks." Brown said.

"you said another Forerunner artifact, what artifact is it?" Ghost asked.

"the Morning Sun itself. Now before you start bombarding me with questions, let me explain. When the Morning Sun was originally completed, it came with a standard Supercarrier human reactor. But the PFC requires a _massive _amount of energy to use. So I began searching Forerunner sites and found what I was looking for, a Forerunner engine reactor that was more then perfect for my needs. I took it from the remains of a Forerunner Dreadnaught on a far away world designated 'Alpha B-15'. the reactor is more then capable of powering everything on this ship. The only problem of using all it's power to it's maximum capability is that the ship wouldn't survive, it's not strong enough. The reactor is barely running at all, that's how much power it has."

"one question, will this affect my Wunderwaffe cannons?" Richtofen asked.

"we already shot them, remember? It has no affect on them, when they're set to disable. If we set them to eviscerate….. I don't think I wanna now what happens if we ever did that."

"how can you be sure we even traveled back and forth through time, how do you know that really happened? Richtofen, Cortana and I look at the data and couldn't make heads or tails of it." Kat said. Richtofen, Cortana, and Kat were the smartest individuals onboard the ship. Seeing that they couldn't make heads or tails of the data really proved just how smart Doc Brown was above the three of them. That, or his knowledge of the PFC was far greater then what they understood.

"if you three couldn't make heads or tails of it, then I can't explain it to everyone else. I'm telling the truth, however. But we have other problems to take care of." Brown said.

"like what?" Makarov asked, toying with a stick grenade.

"we're going back to Reach. A lot of Forerunner tech that I didn't get, not to mention the Task Force is one man short, Jun-266." Brown said. Noble stiffened at that, though no one else noticed. How could they ever explain John's new gas weapon and the people he killed to Jun? Should they even tell him?

"we should also go back and grab any other SPARTAN's that may have survived. It's worth the risk in my opinion. Besides, we won't be breaking the Cole Protocol because the Covie's own Reach now." John said.

"alright. Cortana, prepare the ship to jump, we're going back to Reach. And put the ship to alert 1, I want this thing ready for anything." Brown said. As the crew shuffled out to prep the ship, Dr. Brown said one more thing,

"and someone bring the cloak online, we're gonna need it."

As John was about to leave,

"not you John. We found something that I think you need to see." Brown said.

"what is it?" John asked.

"follow me." Brown said. They ended up in sickbay.

"why are we in sickbay?" John asked. He found his answer. He saw a female SPARTAN lying on a bio-bed with dozens of wires and IV's hooked up to her body.

"Linda." John sighed.

"I found her in a cryo-tube. Apparently, she was shot in the back by an overcharged plasma pistol shot. Her injuries are way too extensive for me to work on."

"you worked on me."

"I don't trust the medical staff at the moment. You know, them being Innies and all."

"use the ones from the Autumn."

"they died during the Fall of Reach."

"look, I have a lot on my mind at the moment, so I can't worry about this. Do what you can." John coldly said.

September 7th, 2552

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

Epsilon Eridani System

Reach

The Covenant never knew a cloaked military warship lay above Reach, 700,000 kilometers above it's surface. In the ship's observation deck,

"looks like they're busy looking for something." Veronica said.

"what could they be looking for, they glassed the whole damn planet." Romeo said.

"not all of it. Looks like they missed a spot, right there." Price said, pointing to a spot the Covenant didn't glass. And they also saw several Covenant ships floating around it.

"13 heavy cruisers, two light cruisers, a pair of DDS-class carriers and an assortment of smaller warships. Piss poor odds for either side, but I wonder what they're doing down there." Price said, referring to when they single handedly destroyed a fleet of 45 Covenant assault carriers with only five SHIVA-nukes and a very dangerous nebula. They dealt a heavy blow to the Covenant, but the nebula done it's damage on the Morning Sun, chewing away at it's ablative hull.

"let's go take a look. I'll explain the plan on the way." Veronica said.

"you know what he's gonna say." Price said as the three soldiers walked out of the deck.

"oh come on, this is his chance to save more SPARTAN's, that's why we started this whole mission in the first place. Besides, he won't say no." Romeo said.

* * *

><p>"did you guys hit your heads on the way over here, or have you gone bat-shit crazy all of a sudden?" John replied.<p>

"told you he would say no." Price whispered to Romeo.

"shut up." Romeo whispered back.

"John, you said so yourself, we could save more SPARTAN's. For all we know, we got survivors down there. We're the only friendly warship around Reach, we gotta at least try."

John sighed. Veronica did come up with a good plan, but it involved the use of a SHIVA nuclear bomb and several Longsword fighter-bomber jets, resources they couldn't risk losing. If she presented this plan during the early years, he would've said yes immediately. But seeing as their supplies were running dangerously low, not to mention the ship hadn't seen a refit dock in over 27 years, John had to completely overhaul his combat tactics and strategies.

"what do we have to lose?" Veronica asked.

"everything, if this plan of yours doesn't work. But if there's a chance to save even one SPARTAN….dammit, I can't believe I'm actually doing this. Your plan's approved, captain. Help me save as many SPARTAN's I can." John said, downing some vodka.

"I'll do what I can, Chief." Veronica said. The four soldiers left John's office and, using a teleported, headed to the bridge.

"Captain, we got a plan to see if we can rescue any survivors." John said.

"explain it to me later, we're picking up a rather weak transmission, we can barely make it out. See if you can't make any sense of it." Keyes said. The message was extremely static; hardly anyone except perhaps the SPARTAN's could identify it.

"Oly Oly Oxen Free." the task force said out loud. John and Jorge taught the Oly Oly Oxen Free tune to the rest of the squad a long time ago.

"come again?" Keyes asked.

"we got SPARTAN's down on the ground. I'm gonna pick 'em up. Keep the ship cloaked and out of the way, but if you have to, start shooting until you run outta bullets. And when that happens, start throwing rocks." John said, smirking.

"give 'em hell." Keyes said as the squad left the bridge. Down in the main hanger deck, Ramius was busy ordering around the deck gang to quickly rearm and refuel the Huey choppers the 141 were using. This choppers were just like the original ones lost at SWORD base, but with one upgrade; these choppers came equipped with a prototype energy shield.

"come on people, get these choppers ready, how hard is it to load some missiles? Come on! Momma's not gonna save you today!" the Russian yelled angrily.

"Ramius, you got our birds ready?" John yelled over the commotion.

"locked, cocked, and ready to rock!" the Russian said.

"don't get cocky, it'll get you killed." John said. A loud klaxon alarm sounded off and a red blinking light illuminated the whole deck.

"alright people, let's get down to the surface and find us some SPARTAN's!" Johnson yelled, hopping on his Huey chopper.

"Ramius, one question. We're not in Reach's atmosphere, so how are we gonna get down to the surface without suffocating in the vacuum?" Carter asked.

"Thel, Brown and Richtofen helped me design new energy shields we can slap on these birds, help keep the oxygen in while keeping the plasma bullets out. I also augmented the propulsion system for space activity. You see the large turbo engine on the top beneath the rotor? I changed it to a jet engine/rocket hybrid motor so we can use these Huey's in space. I've also mounted maneuvering thrusters all around the fuselage to help with steering the ship when in space." Ramius said. Oddly enough, he said all that as if he was very tired and was sick of designing new aircraft.

"I'm impressed." Carter said, but the tone of his voice suggested that he wasn't really impressed at all. The task force boarded their choppers, the large doors opened and the choppers, along with several Longswords carrying one SHIVA nuke flew down. The Covenant didn't detect the group.

"where is everyone?" Carter asked as the Huey's flew over the destroyed planet.

"let's go to that canyon, I'm detecting movement." John said. The Huey gunships roared down into the canyon, hoping no one would shoot at them.

"everyone, we're landing down there. I'll take point! Watch the rocks, watch the river, watch any damn place where the Covenant might be hiding!" John yelled as he lowered his chopper down on the ground, the metal skids scraping against the hard rock.

"I'm picking up movement!" Johnson yelled.

"where?" Roebuck, Makarov, and Castro yelled.

"over there! One individual, can't tell if it's human or Covenant!" Johnson yelled.

"proceed with caution! If it's Covenant, wound it so we have a prisoner!" Carter ordered. The group quickly moved and found that it wasn't a Covenant soldier; it was a lone SPARTAN super-soldier.

"Anton?" John and Jorge asked.

"I thought you guys were dead." Anton said.

"we're not. We're looking for survivors."

"uh, I can take you to Admiral Whitcomb, he might be able to help you." Anton said.

"where is he?" Carter said, removing his helmet. Anton didn't recognize him; John and Jorge knew why.

"Anton, where's the admiral?" Jorge pressed.

"I'll take you to him." Anton said. He then spotted the rest of the squad.

"we'll explain later." Carter said. Anton led the Task Force 141 to an entrance to a large cavern where two SPARTAN's were manning AIE-486H heavy machine guns bolted down to large boulders.

"somewhat crude, but it's better then nothing." Dempsey noted. The group went into the cavern where they spotted Admiral Whitcomb at a large fold-out card table, studying a large map of the area. The walls of the cavern were lined with only a few computer screens, consoles, and few racks holding MA5B assault rifles.

"what's this?" John asked.

"Camp Independence. I thought you and the rest of the SPARTAN's were with Captain Keyes on RED FLAG. what happened?" Whitcomb asked.

"the attack on Reach happened. Carter-259, commanding officer of Noble Team. These are the survivors Noble picked up." Carter said.

"I don't recognize you. Are you from the second class of the II's?" Grace asked.

"no, we're SPARTAN-III's, new generation of SPARTAN super-soldiers working under Colonel Ackerson. You got a problem with that?" Carter asked, glaring at Grace. John had to admit, Carter could be very intimidating when he wanted to.

"what happened to RED FLAG?" Whitcomb asked.

"cancelled when Reach was attacked. When Reach fell, Pillar of Autumn had to make a blind jump to escape. Found a giant ring world the Covenant call Halo; we blew it up, though we lost the Autumn. We got another ship, though." John said.

"Commander, this is Captain Keyes, I'm sending down some reinforcements. Figured you would need 'em." the captain said over the comm.

"bring 'em down." Carter said, mentally sighing at the fact that the 141 didn't need any reinforcements. A pelican then came down, loaded with Marines and one ONI agent.

"Fire Team Charlie, Sergeant Parker commanding, Sergeant Mobuto is second in command. I got with me Jenkins, Fitzgerald, Mendoza, Kappus, Bisenti, Riley, and O'Brian. I also have Lt. Elias Haverson, our ONI attachment."  
>"good to have you with us, sergeant." was all that Carter said, believing them to be nothing more than red shirts.<p>

"Admiral Whitcomb, we came down here to look for any survivors. More specifically, SPARTAN's; we picked up an 'Oly Oly Oxen Free' signal, but it didn't come from here. Any idea where it came from?" John asked, growing impatient.

"the reason I stayed behind is because I'm working on a new type of nuclear bomb called NOVA. I was trying to arm it, but the marines with me are all dead. So I called in Red Team to help me out."

"how many NOVA bombs do you have?" John asked.

"one. Well, technically I have two, but the second one isn't completed yet."

"gimme the second one. Leave the first behind. Now where's Red Team?" John asked.

"I'll take you to them. Do you have any form of transport, preferably air?" Whitcomb resigned.

"we got them."

"good. I can take you directly to where Red Team is." Whitcomb said.

"alright. You got any transport of your own?"

"one Pelican, Sheila Poloski is the captain."

"good, we'll need all the firepower we can get. Haverson, you're going with Whitcomb." John said.

"yes sir." Haverson said almost hesitantly.

"wait, those are your transports?" Whitcomb said once he got a very good look at the Huey gunships.

"trust me, they'll get the job done." John said, climbing into his chopper and starting up the engine. The air convoy of several Huey choppers and two Pelicans took to the skies, careful not to catch the attention of Covenant troops.

"there's the cavern where Red Team is hiding. Let's go down there." Whitcomb ordered from his Pelican.

"alright. Everyone, stay on your guard, we don't know what's down there." John said. The choppers and Pelicans slowly headed down the large cavern, wondering what would be waiting for them. They soon got to the bottom, where they found a small group of Covenant soldiers, a few Elites, some Jackals, and mostly Grunts, clearing out what appeared to be a large cave in.

"smoke 'em." John whispered. All the Huey's immediately opened up with rocket and machine gun fire, tearing the Covenant into splatter.

"that's a little excessive, don't you think?" Whitcomb asked.

"nope. Sergeant Parker, move you're Pelican over there, gimme some cover." Carter ordered. The Pelican moved over to the left, blocking a large hole in the rock. John then whistled out a familiar tune. Four SPARTAN's then walked out.

"Kelly, Fred, Will, Jun, you guys alright?" John yelled out.

"we're fine! Um, what the heck are you doing in an old Huey gunship?" Fred asked.

"I'll explain later. Where's Dr. Halsey?" John asked. Halsey walked out, holding a large, fist-sized crystal.

"what's that?" John pointed.

"what they were looking for." Whitcomb said. Suddenly, the Pelican carrying the marines Captain Keyes sent down exploded in a large fireball.

"oh come on!" Roebuck yelled.

"Covenant! All around us! Holy shit, there must be thousands of them!" Makarov yelled. Fred, Kelly, Jun, and Will formed a triangle position around Dr. Halsey, while the Huey's locked-and-cocked their missiles and machine guns.

"let 'em have it!" John yelled. The Hueys and their occupants immediately opened fire, prompting the Covenant to fire back. Problem was, the Huey's didn't have much room to maneuver, so while their rockets Makarov built were very effective in the beginning, they didn't matter much because they didn't come in a swivel. But the sheer amount of machine gun fire they put out was enough to counter the rocket problem.

"Fred, get Kelly, Jun, Will and Halsey into Whitcomb's pelican, we can't pick you up in the Hueys!" John yelled, firing his MA5C assault rifle at a pair of Elites.

"we gotta get the hell outta here!" Mason yelled.

"right! Whitcomb, you got the survivors?" John yelled.

"I got 'em!"

"lead the way, get us outta here!" John yelled. The Pelican turned around and roared out of the cavern, followed by the 141's Huey gunships, their guns firing madly. That was enough to catch the attention of the Covenant. Banshee's, Spirit and Phantom drop ships, and Seraphs all gave chase after the fleeing Huey's and single Pelican.

"CAPTAIN KEYES, WE NEED AN IMMEDIATE EXTRACTION, RIGHT FUCKING NOW! WE FOUND SURVIVORS, BUT WE NEED TO GET THE HELL OUTTA HERE, RIGHT FUCKING NOW!" John screamed.

"roger that, here's your extraction." Keyes said. Suddenly, the pursuing covenant aircraft were shot outta the sky. The UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun then decloaked, her 50mm turrets firing angrily.

"that's one big ship." Fred said.

"that's our ride outta this shithole." John sighed.

"you guys aren't gonna believe this, we found one more ship that survived. The UNSC Gettysburg. I temporarily put Miranda in command, but I had to transfer a small part of the crew to the Gettysburg."

"whatever works, Captain Keyes. Just get us the hell outta here, now!" John growled. When the Huey's and Pelican landed, John quickly ran into Whitcomb's Pelican for two reasons: one, he wanted to make sure the SPARTAN's and Dr. Halsey were alright, and two, he wanted to see if his newly acquired bomb was still in working condition.

"glad to see you guys are alright. What's that you're holding?" John asked Dr. Halsey.

"an alien crystal we found under CASTLE base. It contains… unique properties pertaining to slipspace. You look rather distracted, John. Is something wrong?" Halsey inquired.

"I need you in sickbay right now. Linda's badly hurt, the ship doesn't exactly have a medical staff, you're the only one who can fix her up." John said heavily.

"what about this bomb?" Kelly asked.

"DEMPSEY! ROEBUCK! GRAB THIS BOMB AND TAKE IT TO THE ARMORY!" John yelled. Two men dressed in World War II-era BDU's with BAR's slung over their shoulders walked in, grabbed the large bomb, and hauled it out.

"who are they?" Will asked.

"Marines, just like everyone else. Follow me to the conference room, I need to inform you of the situation, and just how bad it really is." John sighed. That was really a ploy; he judging by the reaction from the 141 and Cortana, he didn't want anyone else to find out about his Nova 6. The squad wouldn't tell, they were too stunned. But Cortana…. He'd figure that out later. He led the survivors to the conference room and threw his helmet on the table outside. He also called Anton, Li, and Grace to inform them as well. Bad mistake. While Dr. Halsey worked with Professor Brown on Linda, and John informed the survivors of the events on Installation 04 (he kept out the part of using Nova 6), Kat secretly downloaded select files from John's helmet camera, more specifically, the one where he witnessed Silva and his men suffering from Nova 6. She also managed to tap into the camera from the destroyed UNSC frigate where it took place to get a much wider view of the gas weapon being used. Kat smirked to herself as she pocketed the potential blackmailing data and put the helmet back on the table. John never knew what had just happened.

"all hands, we are preparing for slipspace jump in 3... 2... 1... Jumping." Keyes' voice came over the comm. The two human warships flew into a slipspace realm and left Reach. Unfortunately, several Covenant warships witnessed the event and followed them into the anomaly. On the bridge,

"what the hell just happened?" Keyes yelled.

"I'm reading several Covenant warships, they followed us! It's that damn crystal Halsey brought onboard, it's distorting the slipspace field! Sucked the Covenant ships right in! Shit, they're firing!" Richtofen yelled, his hands dancing furiously across the console at the science station.

"Cortana, you have full control of weapons, keep 'em off our backs! And keep this ship between the Covenant fleet and the Gettysburg!" Keyes ordered. The massive Supercarrier somehow maneuvered in the field, putting the smaller frigate in front and the Covenant fleet behind.

"let 'em have it!" Keyes angrily yelled. Cortana aimed the guns to the rear and immediately opened up. And so did the pursuing Covenant ships. Just one tiny problem: the slipspace field caused the plasma torpedoes and high velocity, armor piercing incendiary artillery rounds and missiles to fly rather erratically; performing loop-de-loops, flying in complete circles, disappearing from the field to appear moments later in a different position, etc. That did not prevent the Covenant and Cortana to try and shoot each other out of the sky.

"captain, I'm detecting Elites on the outer hull, they're trying to disable our missile pods!" Cortana yelled.

"use the 50mm turrets on them! And if that don't work, send some SPARTAN's out to stop them, we have to survive this battle!" Keyes ordered. Suddenly, the sound of metal bending was heard.

"what the fuck is that now?" Keyes yelled angrily.

"it's the slipspace field, it's tearing the ship apart!" Richtofen yelled.

"can we leave the field?" Keyes yelled.

"we got over 12 cruisers waiting for us, I don't think it would be best to take them on in our current situation." Cortana replied.

"fuck. FUCK! Alright, get in close to those cruisers and engage them at point-blank range! See if we can't hold out a little longer! And someone gimme a report on those Elites trying to sabotage our ship!" Keyes yelled. Out on the hull, John was leading the SPARTAN's to stop the saboteurs. The Morning Sun projected a field around the ship that prevented the SPARTAN's from flying out into slipspace, but it also prevented the Elites from suffering the same fate. They were all armed with MA5B assault rifles, but the only long range weapon was the DG sniper rifle that Jun wielded.

"MAKE SURE YOU'RE TETHERS ARE SECURE, I DON'T WANT ANYONE FLYING OFF! JUN, START PICKING 'EM OFF!" John yelled. Jun eagerly began doing so. Problem was, the 115 in the advanced rifle constantly interfered with slipspace field surrounding them. There was a reason why they never used DG weapons in a slipspace field before. So when Jun pulled the trigger, the rifle exploded. Sighing, Jun let go of his rifle and switched back to his trusty SRS-99 rifle. As the SPARTAN's engaged the Elites, heavy gun fire tore the floating Elites to shreds. John looked behind and saw Polaski's Pelican behind them.

"thought you could use a little support." Sheila said.

"thanks for the help." John said. As they continued their fight against the Elites,

"hold on, incoming plasma torpedo! Everyone take cover!" Sheila yelled. She quickly maneuvered her Pelican over Li, Grace, and Anton who were out in the open to protect them from the shot. Unfortunately, the large blast radius vaporized the Pelican and the three SPARTAN's.

"CHIEF, WE'RE GONNA GET PICKED OFF OUT HERE! WE GOTTA GET BACK INSIDE THE SHIP!" Kat yelled.

"WE CAN HOLD 'EM OFF!" John replied.

"JOHN, THAT PLASMA SHOT JUST DESTROYED A PELICAN AND KILLED TWO SPARTANS! WE'RE ALL GONNA END UP DEAD!" Kelly yelled. Another plasma shot slammed into the hull, sending Kelly flying.

"KELLY!" John yelled. He was too far away to grab her. The tether still held her, but she was knocked out.

"JOHN, WE GOTTA GET THE FUCK OUTTA HERE! NOW!" Emile screamed.

"ALRIGHT, EVERYONE GET BACK IN THE SHIP! SOMEONE CONTACT THE BRIDGE, TELL THEM WE LOST POLASKI, ANTON-044, GRACE-093, AND LI-008! AND TELL THEM THAT THE SABATUERS ARE DEAD!" John yelled. The SPARTAN's tiredly collapsed into the ship through a hatch Jorge opened up.

"everyone get to the fucking bridge! I'll get Kelly to the sickbay!" John ordered, grabbing the wounded SPARTAN and rushing her to the sickbay. Up in the bridge,

"how many ships are left?" Whitcomb yelled.

"I would guess three to five! We can't stay in the field, admiral, it's tearing the ship apart!" Cortana warned.

"we got any nukes?" Keyes yelled.

"for what?" Richtofen yelled.

"I got a plan! We need to leave the field immediately! Cortana, drop us out to normal space! Just as we're leaving, drop all the nukes we got, Covie ships will smack right into them! Leave them set to go off once they hit anything!" Keyes yelled. No one liked it, but it was better then nothing. Cortana had to expand the field to encompass the Gettysburg. Once that was done, she dropped the field and let go of all the nukes they were carrying. They barely escaped the field before the Covenant ships slammed into the nukes, destroying the ships and killing all the crew while trapped in slipspace. Not a pleasant way to go.

"let's never do that again." Jacob sighed, taking off his sweat-soaked uniform and putting it on the rack, revealing his rather muscular form with an ODST tattoo on his right arm. He pulled out his pipe, lit it, and took an extremely long drag.

"alright, where the fuck are we?" he sighed.

"uh, you guys ain't gonna believe this. We're near the Eridanus system in the outer colonies. The crystal, combined with our slipspace engine and Forerunner reactor warped the field. The speed we went was….. let's just say no one's gonna be breaking that record any time soon." Richtofen sighed.

"damage report." Whitcomb said.

"uh… better than most of what we've gone through. The hull integrity is at 65%, and our shields are still strong. The rear missile launchers are slightly damaged, but that's nothing we haven't encountered." Richtofen stated off.

"haven't encountered?" Keyes asked.

"we've destroyed larger fleets in far worse conditions with far less weapons, captain, believe me." Cortana stated as a matter-of-fact and not in a bragging manner.

"alright, can we fix up the ship right now?" Keyes asked.

"to be honest, I'm surprised this thing hasn't fallen apart; it's seen so much damage and we haven't visited a dry-dock in years. The honest truth is this: despite how tough this ship his, I estimate that we will lose complete structural integrity in the next three to five months if we get into another battle like that in a slip space field. A regular battle like the one's we've been doing, we'll lose the integrity in nine months." Richtofen said.

"is he right? Is that the truth?" Keyes said.

"he's exaggerating. The real truth is this: we'll lose integrity in 2 months in a slipspace field, a regular battle we'll lose the integrity in 4 months. I'm an A.I., I know more about the ship then you do, Richtofen." Cortana said with a arrogant smirk.

"there are times when I wish I was an A.I." the Nazi stared at Cortana.

"alright, let's focus on the bigger picture. We need to find a place to make repairs and regroup. Where the hell are we anyway?" John said, walking into the bridge. He managed to hear the whole conversation, however.

"to be honest, I don't think we have time to make repairs; during the battle, I managed to pick up a Covenant radio transmission over their BattleNet system. You guys aren't gonna like it." Cortana said.

"what is it?" Whitcomb asked.

"the Covenant are assembling a large fleet to destroy Earth. They're meeting at a large Covenant station called 'Unyielding Hierophant.' "

"then shouldn't are priority be to destroy the station?" Keyes asked.

"not in our condition; this ship is in no way to put up any fight. We need to make repairs, and make 'em fast. We're near the Eridanus system, we can make repairs there." Richtofen said rather forcefully.

"anything else?" John sighed.

"yeah. That Forerunner Crystal we grabbed? It's emitting some sort of radiation that will kill the entire crew in, probably five days. The element 115 is all that's protecting us. I can discharge some radiation from the Wunderwaffe cannons, but that'll only slow down the crystal's radiation." Richtofen said.

"do it." Keyes sighed, desperately needing a drink.

"and get us to the Eradinus System, let's make repairs there." Whitcomb sighed.

September 12, 2552

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

UNSC Gettysburg

Eradinus System

The UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun and the UNSC Gettysburg gently soared into the asteroid belt of the Eradinus System.

"alright, let's make contact with the rebel base, let's try and... Persuade them into helping us repair our ship." Whitcomb said.

"how do we do that, rebels ain't gonna help us." Dempsey said, leaning on his B.A.R

"wouldn't hurt to ask 'em." Keyes said.

"establishing contact with Eradinus Secundus. Shit, they're responding. You're on, admiral." Richtofen said.

"this is Vice Admiral Danforth Whitcomb, commanding the UNSC super-carrier Rise of the Morning Sun. Our ship has taken heavy damage and we request immediate help."

"this is Governor Jacob Jiles of Eradinus Secundus. I have nukes aimed at your ship, admiral. The UNSC isn't welcome here, I suggest you leave." Jiles said.

"Governor, I have a MAC solution aimed at your main base, I suggest you reconsider you're previous statement." Whitcomb said. Seconds turned to minutes as silence floated around the bridge of the Morning Sun. Everyone wondered if Jiles really did have nukes. After a long moment of silence,

"fine. I'll grant you a refit and repairs. I don't have any nukes." Jiles said.

"that's good. I have to say, our MAC cannon is off-line at the moment. Hell, most of our weapons are off line." Whitcomb sighed heavily.

"alright, we'll help you repair your ship." Jiles said. The small fleet of Insurrection ships guided the massive super-carrier into a large dry dock that rather small for the Morning Sun. It was all they had, however.

"if anyone needs me, I'll be down in sickbay, I'm gonna check up on our SPARTAN's." John sighed, wondering if Linda and Kelly were gonna live. He had one pit stop he had to make, however. He went down to the armory, grabbed the unfinished NOVA bomb and headed to the main hanger bay where the Gettysburg was docked. He opened the airlock and brushed past the crew as he headed down to the engine room. _perfect. No one suspects anything, everything's going exactly as planned_ John thought as he hid the large bomb behind the reactor and covered it with crates and pieces of scrap metal. Hopefully, no one would find it. He stood up and heard Whitcomb's voice over the comm.

"all forces on the UNSC Gettysburg, you are ordered to strip the ship and bring all personal, weapons, materials, and supplies back to the Morning Sun for the refit and repair."

"son of a bitch!" John yelled. No one heard him. Thinking fast, he quickly set up a remote-controlled detonator on the bomb and synced it with the comm systems on his helmet. He had to create a password that no one would know, however.

"I got it. Password: Kiss my shiny metal ass." John said, smiling. Once the detonator was synced up, John put his helmet back on and headed out of the Gettysburg and ran down the hallways of the Morning Sun to the sickbay.

"Doctor, how are they doing?" John quickly asked.

"they'll live. For Linda, I had to transplant new kidneys and a liver. She sustained a lot of damage, I'm surprised she's still alive. For Kelly… that plasma torpedo gave her 3rd degree burns on over 72% of her body, despite her armor's protection. She had to be injected with dermacartic steroids for her to recover."

"but she'll live? They'll both live?" John asked.

"yes."

"good." John said. His stare lingered on the two female SPARTAN's for a long time. It wasn't that he felt any romantic feelings about them; it was that he wanted so desperately to keep the SPARTAN's alive, and he felt that he failed in that when he inadvertently started the war. He wouldn't fail again, something that bordered in idealism as well as insanity. Some of the 141 were beginning to believe that John had reached insanity some time ago. Up in the bridge,

"how soon can we get the ship underway?" Carter asked.

"I'll give them their credit; they know how to fix a ship. It's not completely fixed, but the ship should be underway in about 5 days. Earlier projections showed we'd be battle ready in two months." Kat said.

"they are quick. I still don't trust 'em, though." Emile said, sharpening his kukri. That's when a Covenant ship jumped in.

"Covenant tracked us here! Destroy that ship, now!" Keyes ordered. The Morning Sun prepped her MAC cannon and fired, followed by a large volley of high-yield, armor-piercing, incendiary Archer missiles. Courtesy of Makarov and his buddies. The Covenant ship was quickly destroyed.

"that was only a scout, they'll bring reinforcements." Carter said.

"we can't stay here. Wonder if it was that crystal that alerted them to our presence." Keyes said.

"doesn't matter. Bring the ship to combat status, we need to hold out while our slipspace engine is repaired." Whitcomb ordered. Down in sickbay,

"I'm sorry, Kelly." Halsey whispered. She injected a massive amount of morphine into the SPARTAN, which knocked her out. Luckily, Linda was still sleeping. Ensign Locklear then arrived.

"Ensign, listen to me very carefully. This crystal needs to be destroyed; it's what distorted the slipstream field around the ship, what brought us here. It's what allowed the Covenant to follow us here. I can't trust ONI to have it. I trust that you'll destroy it."

"I'll destroy it." Locklear said somberly.

"good. Now, I need your help. There's an old Chiroptera-class stealth vessel docked with this ship. Don't tell anyone, I'm gonna take and get Kelly outta here. I can't risk taking Linda, two missing SPARTAN's would attract too much attention."

"alright, I'll help you." Locklear sighed, pocketing the crystal. As the two carried Kelly to the airlock, they found Kat casually leaning against the wall as if she was waiting for them.

"take care of that crystal, Ensign. I'll help Dr. Halsey." Kat said. Locklear then left.

"if you're wondering how I know about you stealing Kelly and taking her somewhere safe, I can hack through every system on the ship, including internal communications. I'll keep your secret, if you keep mine." Kat said, helping Halsey move the unconscious Kelly into the ship.

"what secret?" Halsey asked. Kat pulled out a data chip from her belt.

"it concerns your favorite SPARTAN, John-117."

"what about him?" Halsey asked, a little suspicious about Kat.

"he built a biochemical WMD and used it on his own soldiers. I'm not trying to discredit him, I'm trying to warn you about him, I have a feeling that he'll do something rather drastic that'll get a lot of people killed." Kat said.

"how do I know that you made this video footage up? You're a very imaginative person, not to mention your sadism borders on BDSM and S&M." Halsey said. Kat took that as a compliment.

"I may be very sadistic, and I do admit I have a very active imagination, but there's no way I could think up something like this. Trust me, this footage is 100% real." Kat said, giving Halsey the data-chip. Halsey took the controls of the stealth ship.

"you know I'm telling the truth." Kat said as she closed the airlock. The stealth ship left the Morning Sun, activated it's FTL drive and left the system.

"where the hell is she going?" Whitcomb asked angrily.

"I don't know. I don't care at the moment, we gotta get the hell outta here." Keyes said as a large Covenant fleet appeared in the system.

"wait, you can't leave us alone and defenseless! Please help us!" Jiles wailed over the comm.

"My duty is clear, governor: to protect the men and women of Earth-not a pack of privateers and outlaws." Whitcomb said, cutting the comm off.

"I don't exactly agree with this." Jorge said.

"This is not the Alamo and I am not Colonel William Barret Travis, although I dearly wish I were. No, we're running. We're trading hundreds of lives for millions. Hell, hundreds of lives for millions. No, duty be damned… I'm still gonna burn in hell for this. Cortana, get us the hell outta here. And God please forgive me for this. If he can't, no one else will." Whitcomb said. As the Morning Sun, with the Gettysburg docked in it's main hanger bay, activated the slipstream engine and left the rebels to be massacred by the Covenant, in the cargo bay, Locklear took one of Makarov's C4 explosive packets and tied it to the crystal. The packet was actually fifteen sticks of dynamite stacked in three rows of five, two bricks of regular C4, and two explosive plasma charges he scrounged from the Covenant. It was all bound tightly by explosive det-cord.

"I love you, Sheila." Locklear sighed as he hid behind a Warthog and pressed the button. The resulting explosion not only destroyed the crystal, but vaporized the Warthog and Locklear with it. It also created a small crater in the metal floor of the cargo bay. The UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun and the UNSC Gettysburg left the Eridanus System, leaving the rebels to be slaughtered by the Covenant.

September 13, 2552

Tau Ceti System, Oort Cloud

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

UNSC Gettysburg

"there it is, the Unyielding Hierophant. Now, how do we destroy it?" Whitcomb asked.

"first off, how many ships have we detected?" Keyes asked.

"holy shit. there's 500 warships out there, all poised to attack Earth." Kat said in disbelief.

"we gotta stop that fleet by any means necessary." Keyes said.

"and how are we gonna do that, we're only two ships, we can't destroy that fleet by ourselves. And if we all die here, what's to stop this fleet from destroying Earth, they'll completely overwhelm her defenses." Dempsey said. Keyes had an idea. Getting on HIGHCOM channel,

"Attention, all UNSC colonies, redirect all armed UNSC warships back to Earth for defense and counterattack; Earth is under attack by Covenant forces, I say again, redirect all armed UNSC ships to Earth for a regroup and counter-attack against attacking Covenant ships, Earth is now under attack. How copy, over?" Keyes broadcasted to any UNSC colony or ship that could hear him. That wasn't much of a problem, however, the Morning Sun boasted an extremely powerful COM system.

"does that calm you down?" the captain smirked at the American Marine.

"you didn't answer my question, how are we gonna destroy that fleet?" Dempsey asked angrily.

"I got an idea. Whitcomb, you and Haverson take the Gettysburg and slingshot around the moon and fly past the fleet. when they're distracted, we'll take the Morning Sun in and destroy the station." John said.

"and how do you plan on doing that, you got any nukes?" Haverson asked.

"we got weapons to destroy that fleet. just take the frigate and distract them, we'll do all the heavy lifting." John reassured them. Whitcomb and Haverson didn't like it, but they decided it was better than nothing. they boarded the now empty frigate, which still had John's NOVA bomb onboard, and took the frigate behind the large moon.

"now that that's outta the way." John muttered.

"what do you mean by that?" Miranda asked.

"I think it's time we give those Nazi guns of ours a test run, set to eviscerate." John said, an evil smirk forming on his face.

"so why'd you have-"

"the whole purpose is that when the frigate flies past the fleet, the fleet will give chase and leave their back unprotected."

"alright. but these Wunderwaffe Cannons, will they destroy the Gettysburg?" Captain Keyes asked.

"we honestly don't know, we've never fired them on eviscerate before." Richtofen said. That only helped to darken the mood.

"alright, let's get this over with. Dr. Brown, please put in your key and input your firing code." Richtofen said. Brown and Richtofen put in tall, slender keys that glowed purple in the computer console that was strictly built only for the Wunderwaffe Cannons. After slowly turning the keys to the left, they typed in set command functions.

"Cortana?" Jacob asked.

"the Wunderwaffe cannons are charging now. 20%…. 65%…. 78%…. 100%, they're charged and ready to go." Cortana announced.

"where's the frigate?" John asked.

"they're right behind the station, the Covenant are mobilizing their fleet."

"can we get a lock on the Covenant space station?" John asked.

"we already have a lock." Brown said.

"good." John said. Immediately after he said that, he pressed the fire button. The two large Wunderwaffe cannons shot a stream bright, blue, plasma that crackled and shot out lighting bolts at whatever it touched. The force was enough to jolt the ship back and make everyone onboard grab something to keep them from falling. The two beams hit the Covenant space station, causing it and the frigate to go up in an insanely massive ball of brilliant electrical fire. The NOVA bomb went off as well, ensuring that any remaining Covenant ship would be destroyed. The resulting shockwave caused the crust of the moon to melt away before it destroyed the planetoid.

"GET THE SLIPSTREAM DRIVE ONLINE, DRAW ALL POWER TO THE SHIELDS AND SUBLIGHT ENGINES! GET US OUTTA HERE RIGHT NOW!" Captain Keyes screamed.

"no need, the shockwave won't destroy us. When I hid the NOVA bomb on the Gettysburg, I positioned it so that their main reactor would take most of the blast, the shockwave is just a mild aftershock." John said calmly. Mild aftershock was the complete opposite of what they felt. When the wave it, it slammed into the ship with such force it sent it flying backwards. Anything that wasn't tied down went flying. When the super carrier was done performing summersaults in space,

"sitrep! gimme a damage report!" Keyes yelled.

"the slipspace engine is damaged, our hull has suffered major catastrophic damage; there are red lights all across the board, our weapons took a major blow. Our MAC cannons are currently off-line, all our Archer pods are cold, we'll have to rekey the main system. Surprisingly, the main electrical grid and our sublight engines are still functioning properly." Brown coughed, wiping some blood off his forehead.

"alright, I gotta get to sickbay." Keyes said, seeing as his arm was currently broken at the elbow 90 degrees. The wrong way. Brown helped escort the wounded captain out of the bridge.

"dammit, looks like engineering needs my help." Cortana said, her naked avatar disappearing from the holo-tank. John tried to get up, but found himself slammed into the bulkhead by a very angry Commander Carter.

"WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL US YOU PLANTED A NOVA BOMB ON THE GETTYSBURG? WERE YOU EVER GONNA TELL US OF THAT GODDAMN STUNT OF YOURS?" Carter screamed. John quickly grabbed Carter's iron-like grip and flung him on the floor.

"alright, commander, listen up! Yes, I hid the NOVA bomb on the Gettysburg without telling anyone, but I had my own personal reasons for doing so! I wanted to make sure there was a fallback plan to wiping out the fleet incase the Wunderwaffe Cannons didn't work!"

"you mean to tell me you knew about the bomb and didn't tell anyone else?" Carter asked angrily.

"more then that, I had the password to detonate the bomb if I wanted to." John said, grinning malevolently. The implication was horrifying; John could've blown up both ships if he wanted to, and no one would've been able to stop him. John let go of the commander and left the bridge. Kat helped her lover up to his feet.

"that is not a good sign, my friends." Carter said.

"I can't believe he did that. He's done plenty of crazy things in the past, but this tops it all." Polonsky said.

"hiding a nuclear bomb in another starship that could destroy us as well, he's fucking crazy." Veronica said.

"it's almost as if he doesn't care about the squad anymore." Foley said slowly.

"it never was about the 141; it was all about him getting his revenge against the Covenant, that's what this is all about." Shepherd retorted.

"it's like we don't even know him anymore." Jorge said.

"we may have to do something about this. We may have to do it sooner than later." Carter said.

* * *

><p><strong>Looks like Carter's gonna have the 141 rebel against John. Wonder what's gonna happen now. Read and Review!<strong>


	7. Chapter 6

**I don't own Halo or Call of Duty. I only own the Morning Sun, Dr Brown, the Wunderwaffe Cannons, and anything else I mentioned the previous chapters.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 6<p>

October 20, 2552

Sol System, Earth

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

ODP Platform _Cairo_

The trip back to Earth was extremely long. The slipspace drive had been severely damaged due to the shockwave, so slipspace travel was out of the question. Keyes suggested that most of the crew go into cryosleep, but the damage to the ship was so extensive that everyone had to help out. By the time they made it back to Earth, most of the ship had been fully repaired, including all the weapons and the slipspace engine. Right now, the ship was now having all her missile pods being restocked. FLEETCOM and HIGHCOM wanted to know where the Morning Sun actually came from seeing as it wasn't in their logs. But seeing as they were losing the war badly, they didn't really give it a second thought, arguing that they needed all the ships they had. In the Cairo's armory, John and Carter were busy discussing what to do now that they were back at Earth. Carter wasn't paying much attention to what they were saying, he was more focused on stopping John-117, though he made sure that he wouldn't leak it out. So far, they discussed the issue on the Arbiter. They both decided it would be best if he stayed inside the Morning Sun, no matter what happened, and he wouldn't leave to fight with the squad.

"alright, what else is on the agenda?" Carter asked.

"we now got two Miranda Keyes. Our Miranda, and the one onboard the In Amber Clad. So I told our Miranda to hide on the In Amber Clad to merge with her past self first chance she got. And as for Veronica and her team, I told them to hide out on the Say My Name and wait for the right moment. I'm also gonna be splitting the 141." John said.

"come again?" that caught Carter's attention.

"I'm putting Shepherd, Foley, Dunn, and Ramirez onboard the Say My Name. They're gonna jump with the ODST's."

"why?" Carter stared at his superior officer.

"call it a gut feeling; those ODST's are gonna need them now."

"but why those four, that doesn't seem like enough."

John just sighed; it was times like this when Carter was very thick headed that John hated having him as his XO.

"just trust me on this one, Commander."

"like how Silva trusted you back on Halo? Or how Whitcomb and Haverson trusted you back when we destroyed that fleet?"

At this point, John had enough.

"fine. Don't trust me. But tell me one time when I let this squad down during the past 26 years. You do that, I'll give you command." John replied. Technically, Carter didn't want to command the 141, but he didn't agree with a lot of John's plans. But John had a point, he never let the squad down, he kept every member alive since it was formed.

"alright, split up the squad. I may not agree with it, but I'll follow your orders, Master Chief." Carter said as he gave a sarcastic salute and left the armory. He also sneered the last two words, reminding them both that the command structure was very off. Technically, Carter should be in command of the 141. But everyone unanimously voted John in as the main CO. Some of the members, however, were started to feel that was a mistake. But there was no changing that now, they would have to wait until the war was over.

"ah, to hell with him." John muttered.

"to hell with what?" the armory officer asked.

"ah, I was just chatting with Commander Carter about our next mission, he doesn't really like what I have in mind." John said.

"didn't you know you SPARTAN's were the talkative type."

"it's the new me." John smirked as he drank from his flask.

"I didn't know SPARTAN's could drink either."

"what's to stop us?" John asked, almost as if he was challenging the Marine to take the flask away.

"nothing, I guess. Well, I've been going over this new armor you got, and I can't make heads or tails of it. Whatever it is, it's really advanced. The armor we were gonna give you is the Mk. VI armor, just came up from Seongnam this morning."

"give it to another SPARTAN that needs it, I'm sure you'll be able to find one." John said, pocketing the flask. John and Noble Team had been wearing the Mk. IV armor for over 27 years, and it hadn't failed them at all. They still had their previous suits of armor in case they truly needed them, but seeing as their current suits held up perfectly, they wasn't any need for them. Didn't mean it hurt to be prepared, however.

"hey Chief, you ready to go?" Johnson asked, stepping into the armory wearing a Navy uniform with a couple of medals pinned on his chest.

"fuck yeah I'm ready, I've been wondering when you were gonna show the fuck up." John said. The armory officer was stunned at John's casual use of profanity.

"what, you didn't know SPARTAN's could swear?" Johnson asked.

"whatever man. Hey sergeant, when are you gonna tell everyone how you made it outta that hell hole?" the officer asked.

"sorry Gunns, that's classified." Johnson replied cockily.

"classified my ass! Well you can forget all about your-" he didn't get a chance to finish because the door closed.

"well, he seems very happy." Carter said, leaning against the wall, his armor putting a slight dent in the side. John noticed that he didn't have his helmet with him; when he was arguing with him, he thought he left his helmet in the tram. _eh, probably left it on the Morning Sun_ John thought, not giving it a second thought.

"maybe Lord Hood didn't give him an invitation." Johnson said as the tram began moving.

"Carter, you coming to the ceremony as well?" John asked.

"heard I'm getting a medal." Carter said.

"for what?"  
>"what I did at Reach."<p>

"Carter, the only thing you did at Reach was snipe at Covenant troops from a Huey gunship. Hell, that's what everyone did. Not so sure if that could earn anyone a medal." John said.

"no one knows about the 141, Chief. From the records I've been able to procure-"

"Kat." Johnson coughed, knowing that Kat stole the records.

"-NOBLE team managed to destroy a large Covenant airbase on the far eastern side of the Viery Territory. Apparently, I was the one that lead the charge and got shot several times in the process. But the base was destroyed." Carter continued uninterrupted.

"my guess is your gonna get a purple heart and maybe a silver star or something." John said.

"to be honest, I don't care about the medals. To me, medals show that your lucky. You wanna be brave, that's in here." Carter said, touching his heart. John-117 and Sgt. Avery Johnson agreed with him on that. The tram then passed an open view of the platform, giving three soldiers a very good view of Earth.

"Earth, haven't seen it in years. Sure looks different without Voi and New Mombassa being glassed to shit. You know, the Orbital Defense Grid was all theory and politics when I shipped out for Basic. Now look! The Cairo is just one of the 300 geo-synch platforms surrounding Earth! With combined fire from the Malta and Athens, nothing's getting past this battle cluster in one piece!" Johnson said proudly.

"oh sure, nothing except the Morning Sun, all we have to do is set the Wunderwaffe Cannons to disable, the entire defense grid would then shut down and leave Earth defenseless." John said casually, earning glances from both Johnson and Carter. They both had the right to question if John was going to plan an attack on Earth, but they both knew that John was speaking the truth: with the Wunderwaffe Cannons, they could bust through anything any enemy threw at them.

"ships have been coming in all day. Looks like Captain Keyes' false message got to a lot of ships. I honestly didn't know we still had this many. You know, rumor around the Cairo is that something big is gonna happen soon." Carter said, looking up and seeing a Marathon-class heavy cruiser soar above them with two light Frigates trailing behind as escorts.

"well, we'll just have to wait and see." John sighed. The tram stopped and the doors opened up to a crowd of UNSC Marines and two video camera drones.

"you guys told me there wouldn't be any cameras." John said, not wanting to be in the spotlight.

"and you told us that you would wear something nice." Johnson remarked.

"Earth needs a lot of heroes right now, John. So smile, would ya, while we still got something to smile about?" Carter remarked, running his fingers through his buzz-cut hair. John desperately longed for a smoke right now, but not in front of the admiralty. The doors opened up to the bridge of the ODP, and the three SPARTAN's walked in. All the naval officers cheered and clapped. John spotted two familiar officers already in formation: Captain Jacob Keyes and Fleet Admiral Terrance Hood. After getting into formation and saluting the highest-ranking officer in the entire UNSC,

"gentleman, we're very lucky to have you back." the elderly admiral said. An officer walked up and whispered something into his ear.

"go ahead, Cortana." Hood said. Cortana's avatar popped up on a nearby holotank. Johnson, Carter, and John all breathed sighs of relief: she was in her original avatar, not the newer buck-naked one.

"another whisper, sir, near Io. We have probes on route."

"I apologize, but we're gonna have to make this quick." the admiral said. Cortana looked up at the three SPARTAN's.

"you look nice." she said.

"thanks." the three soldiers said simultaneously, not knowing who she was actually talking to.

"Sergeant Major, The Colonial Cross is awarded for acts of singular daring and devotion for a soldier of the United Earth Space Corps." Adm. Hood said, pinning a medal on the sergeant's chest.

"Commander Carter, your actions on Reach in the Viery Territory have proven, without a doubt, the usefulness of the SPARTAN Corp and showed the value and honor a member of NAVSPECWAR holds himself to. We hereby present to you the United Nations Space Command Purple Heart and the Congressional United Nations Space Command Medal of Honor for actions above and beyond the call of duty." Hood said, presenting a Purple Heart to the SPARTAN, which he took. He then lowered himself a little to allow Admiral Hood to put the Medal of Honor on, which caused everyone on the bridge to cheer. John, Johnson, Carter and Cortana all had the same things on their minds: _buddy, if only you really knew what the squad and I really did during the war, we'd have every medal in the book except the POW medallion_

"Captain Keyes, your actions above Reach were in keeping with the highest traditions of military service. Your bravery in the face of impossible odds reflects great credit upon yourself and the UNSC. It's very good to have you back, captain." Hood said, pinning a Colonial Cross award on his chest.

"Admiral, we're gonna have to cut this short. I'm reading slipspace ruptures directly off our main battle cluster." Cortana said.

"show me."

The main view screen showed 15 Covenant warships heading toward Earth, it also showed a group of UNSC ships heading to engage the new threat.

"fifteen Covenant capital ships holding position just outside the kill zone."

"this is Fleet Admiral Harper. We are engaging the enemy."

"negative, Admiral. Form a defensive perimeter around the cluster. Captain Keyes, get to your ship, link up with the fleet."

"yes sir." he said, saluting the admiral and leaving the bridge.

"you have the MAC gun, Cortana. As soon as they come in range, open up."

"gladly." she said, her avatar disappearing.

"something's not right, the fleet that destroyed Reach was fifty times this size." Hood said.

"sir, additional contacts. Boarding crafts, and lots of 'em!" a Naval officer said.

"they're going to try and take our guns offline, give their capital ships a straight shot at Earth. Commander, defend this station by any means necessary."

"yes sir, admiral." Carter said. John, Carter, and Johnson quickly stocked up on weapons and munitions and headed off to fight the enemy.

"okay John, your in charge." Carter said, cocking his BR55 battle rifle.

"alright. Johnson, grab that heavy machine gun, we're gonna need it. WHERE'S THE REST OF THE SQUAD?" John yelled out once he realized that he, Johnson, and Carter were all that made up the 141 at the moment.

"I don't know, and I don't care, I just wanna kill me some Covenant." Carter said. They left the bridge and found the rest of the squad in the Recreation area. Although, they were missing the ODST's and four USA Marines.

"nice of you three to join us." Emile said sarcastically.

"PISS OFF!" Carter, Johnson, and John yelled angrily.

"where'd you get the Medal of Honor, Commander?" Jun asked, readying his DMR. The close quarters would be very awkward for his standard sniper rifle.

"look up my file when you get the chance!" Carter yelled.

"how's it going, Malta?" Weaver asked.

"stand-by... They're latched! Check your targets and watch the cross-fires. They're in standard formation: little bastards up front, big ones in back... Good luck, Cairo."

"shit, they're cutting through the bulkhead!" Polonsky warned.

"when they come through, let 'em have it!" Carter growled. The bulkhead blew apart. Immediately, a massive wave of bullets, buckshot, and grenades poured into the small hole, instantly shredding the Grunts, Jackals, and Elites that came to destroy the station.

"alright people, let's get going, we got Covenant to kill!" John ordered, slamming a new clip in his MA5C assault rifle.

"McNamara, take point! Jorge, guard our rear!" Carter bellowed out.

"we're moving out!" McNamara yelled out, cocking his W1200 shotgun. They quickly moved up the ramps and stairs to the first hanger bay where a boarding craft was stuck, piercing the side of the wall, with Covenant troops pouring out.

"kill 'em all!" John yelled, firing his rifle. Within moments, all the Covenant were dead.

"hey, check it out. The Malta's driven off it's boarders." Roebuck said, pointing to the Covenant boarding craft fleeing the orbiting MAC cannon.

"Malta, what's your status?" Cortana asked.

"I don't believe it! They're retreating, we've won!" Malta Actual cried out joyfully. The _Malta_ ODP then blew to pieces.

"we are totally fucked, aren't we?" Makarov said, reloading his M4 rifle.

"we will be if we keep standing around here! Carter, put on your damn helmet, you're no good to me dead!" John ordered. The squad quickly ran to the next hanger where there were more Covenant.

"it never ends, it never fucking ends." Dempsey muttered, firing his B.A.R at an Elite, who dove behind a large crate.

"it'll end, just quit your bitching and keep killing!" Kat yelled, throwing her knife at an Elite's neck, piercing the shielding and killing the Elite instantly. While the 141 and the Cairo's Marines killed off the last of the Covenant boarders in this hanger deck,

"bye-bye, Athens." Richard said.

"come again, Noble Six?" Carter asked. Richard simply pointed to the Athens. Like the Malta before her, the ODP went up in a ball of flame.

"Cortana, assessment!"

"that explosion came from inside the Athens, same as the Malta. They brought a bomb with them."

"then they sure brought one here. Commander, get to the bomb and disarm it immediately!" Hood ordered. He had no idea that it was actually John who commanded the 141. The squad quickly took a route beneath the hanger deck and found themselves against more Elites. Fighting Elites was now getting very tiresome; hell, fighting the Covenant was getting a little pointless for the squad, but it was all they could do to keep themselves alive, before they got shot to pieces by Covenant plasma weapons. They found themselves in the armory. And the master sergeant was outnumbered and armed with only a shotgun while two elites shot him to death.

"come on, is that a weapon or a flashlight? Oh dang it-" was his last words before he died. The elites were quickly mowed down.

"fire teams to Habitat Delta! Everybody, hold fast, incoming Covenant boarding craft! Hostiles have taken over Security Station 1, I need a squad in Habitat Delta immediately!" came the Cairo Defense Coordinator via loudspeaker. The squad rounded a corner and found themselves in a hallway where several Marines and Captain Keyes were firing their MA5C rifles at a large group of Covenant soldiers.

"I was almost onboard until these fuckers showed up!" Keyes swore angrily, firing his MA5C rifle at an Elite Minor.

"don't worry, captain, we're on it!" Johnson yelled, chucking a grenade down the hall. Once all the remaining Covenant were killed,

"I'll buy you a case of vodka for that one, Master Chief." Keyes sighed.

"alright, everyone escort Captain Keyes to the Morning Sun. Noble, you're staying with me." John ordered.

"why the big split up?" Reznov asked, reloading his submachine gun.

"I'm taking the SPARTAN's out there, through the airlock." John sighed, opening the airlock.

"good luck, Master Chief." Keyes saluted. The SPARTAN's went through the airlock and began shooting away the Elite Rangers who had ambushed them. Over the comm.,

"sir, boarders have breached the fire control center. They have a bomb." Cortana warned.

"can you defuse it?" Hood asked.

"yes, but I'll need the Commander's help to make contact with the detonator."

"commander, get to the bomb, double time! Cortana, prioritize targets and fire at will."

"down there, elevator." John pointed out. And there were Covenant on the elevator.

"smoke 'em, Jorge." John ordered. Jorge's HMG tore the Covenant soldiers into bloody slabs of meat.

"alright, let's keep moving, we're gonna have to get to the hanger deck where the bomb is." John said, activating his jetpack and flying to the airlock.

"how do you know it's in a hanger bay?" Jun asked.

"if I was boarding a space station with a bomb, I'd do the same thing they're doing: don't waste time dragging it to the bridge, just plant it and leave." John said, clubbing an Elite with is assault rifle.

"you make a good point." Carter said, sniping a grunt upside down.

"there's the airlock. I'll take point." Emile said.

"admiral, sir, the Covenant carrier just blew past the Malta's debris field, they're heading toward Africa. Request permission to pursue and destroy." Keyes said.

"permission granted, captain." Hood replied.

"you know, there are quite a few Elites guarding the bomb, you guys might wanna get creative." Cortana said. Creative for Noble Team and John-117 was usually just spraying their enemy with as much bullets as possible. Which always worked.

"all hands, we are abandoning Cairo station, I repeat, we are abandoning Cairo station!" a panicked officer yelled over the comm.

"not yet, we're not!" John sighed, slapping his hand over the detonator.

"how much time was left?" Richard asked, slicing the neck of a wounded Elite commando with his knife.

"you don't wanna know." the AI replied distracted.

"I'm taking your answer as it ready to blow." Kat said, reloading her MA37.

"pretty much." Emile muttered, sheathing his kukri. Over the comm.,

"admiral, the carrier's shields are down. I'm in position and ready for immediate assault." Cmdr. Keyes said.

"negative commander, not against a ship that size. Not on your own." Hood.

"sir, permission to leave the station." John asked.

"for what purpose, Master Chief?" Hood and Noble Team asked.

"I'm gonna give the Covenant their bomb back." John said, smiling.

"permission granted." the admiral said. Noble, however, was a little shocked. John simply put Cortana back in his head, then heaved the large bomb on his shoulder and casually walked to the cargo elevator large enough to hold two Scorpion tanks.

"you mind telling us what your plan is?" Jorge asked.

"nope." John said, smiling.

"meh, figures." Emile muttered.

"I'm betting that it's rather crazy." Cortana said.

"then stay here."

"unfortunately for the both of us, I like crazy." she replied. The elevator stopped, and the 6 SPARTAN super-soldiers walked out into an empty Longsword launch bay. There, they saw dozens of frigates getting shot outta the sky as they attempted to destroy the carrier. John set the bomb down rather carelessly and grabbed the door release handle. Noble Team got in position to prepare for a rather violent decompression.

"I just have one question, what if you miss?" Cortana asked.

"I won't miss."

"yeah, but what if you do miss?" Carter asked.

"then it's been an honor serving with you all; we are truly fucked if that happens." John said, pulling the lever. The air suddenly sucked everyone out. John quickly grabbed one of the spikes on the bomb and flew out toward the Covenant carrier. All the SPARTAN's quickly formed up on each other.

"aw shit, energy projector, right in front of us!" Jorge yelled. The SPARTAN's quickly leaned to the leave, narrowly avoiding the hot blast of plasma. Even so, they still felt their skin slightly blister despite the armor. An old Halcyon cruiser, named _UNSC Dawn Under Heaven_, flew past them and took another energy projector shot at point-blank range. Although the armor was violently blasted away, it still held, although the engines were slowly giving out. Two Longswords flew by, firing armor-piercing rockets that burst a hole through the carrier's outer hull. The SPARTAN's quickly soared into the hole, stopping next to the ship's main reactor.

"and here we go." John whispered, pressing his hand to the detonator. The bomb started to whine and the SPARTAN's quickly bugged out. Behind them, the carrier blew to pieces.

"hey Chief, did you plan for a ride?" Kat asked.

"should be coming up right now!" John yelled. The _In Amber Clad_ then soared beneath them. The SPARTAN's then painfully slammed onto the outer hull.

"for a bunch of heavy bricks, they flew pretty good." MacTavish grinned.

"shut the fuck up, Major." Richard groaned.

"get inside and suit up, SPARTAN's, we're taking this fight to the surface." Commander Keyes said. Admiral Hood never noticed the lone frigate leave the battle group.

"there it is, Old Mombassa. Alright, I'm going down to the hanger bay." MacTavish said, grabbing his M4A1 rifle. Now that Shepherd was temporarily reassigned, MacTavish was now in charge of the ship's contingent of Marines. Pelicans loaded with SPARTAN's and Marines roared out of the frigate and headed toward the Covenant Carrier.

"the message just repeats: Regret, Regret, Regret."  
>"catchy, any idea what it means?" Captain Keyes asked.<p>

"dear humanity, we regret being alien bastards. We regret coming to Earth! And we most definitely regret that the CORPS JUST BLEW UP OUR RAGGEDY-ASS FLEET!" MacTavish bellowed.

"ooh-rah!" the pilots in his Pelican answered.

"Regret is a name, Mjr. MacTavish. The name of one of the Covenant religious leaders. A prophet. He's on that carrier and he's calling for help." Cortana scolded the gung-ho Scottish marine. Down on the ground, a recon Marine unit closely eyed LZ.

"Immediate: Grid-Kilo Two Three is hot. Recommend mission abort."

"roger that, Recon. It's your call, Major."

"we're going in. Get tactical, Marines!" MacTavish yelled.

"Sierra-259, get aboard that carrier, and secure the Prophet of Regret. This is the only place on Earth the Covenant decided to land. That Prophet is going to tell us why." Hood ordered. He still believed Carter was in command of the 141. _Better to keep up appearances _the SPARTAN-III thought.

"we're thirty seconds out. Stand by to, whoa. Aw shit!" the pilot yelled out as a Scarab came into view and shot the Pelicans down.

"this is Pelican zero-five-nine! We're going down! I repeat, this is Pelican zero-five-nine! We're going-"the pilot never finished his SOS cry as the Pelican crashed into a brick house.

October 20, 2552

Old Mombassa, Kenya, Earth

"wake up, SPARTAN!" Carter's loud angry voice blasted John's ear drums.

"alright, I'm up. What's our situation?" John asked.

"Elites, Jackals and Grunts pouring into the courtyard!" MacTavish yelled.

"let 'em have it!" Polonsky yelled, firing his M1 Garand rifle. John unsung his MA5C rifle and opened fire on the Elites. Since the Marines and SPARTAN's had the high ground, the Covenant were at a bit of a disadvantage. They had help, however, a Phantom dropship arrived and delivered more troops.

"don't these people know that they're just sending more soldiers to the slaughterhouse?" Roebuck laughed. The amount of gunfire poured into every rooftop, alleyway, or window was rather blistering. The Covenant eventually gave up after the drones they sent were turned into paste splattering the walls of the old houses.

"um, that looks a little small for my Pelican, Commander. How about the LZ on the other side of these buildings?" Ramius asked, maneuvering a heavily-armed Pelican dropship over the rooftops. No doubt he got it from the Morning Sun.

"alright, keep your distance, Nikolai, we caught a lot of grunts with those fuel rod guns."

"roger that." the Russian pilot.

"someone get a charge on the door, ASAP!" Johnson ordered. The doors were blown to pieces before anyone got a charge on.

"aw shit, hunters." a marine cried out.

"it never fucking ends." John sighed. He hopped down from the ledge and charge at the Hunters. The first one crouched down to protect himself from the angry SPARTAN. John simply slapped the shield away and tackled the monstrous alien onto the ground. He then picked it up and slammed it into the other Hunter, pinning the second hunter to the wall, killing him. Tossing the hunter in his hands in the air, he waited for it to slam on the ground. Once it was in range, John simply kicked it with all he could muster. The result was a large, hunter-shaped splatter on the far wall of the courtyard.

"wow, you SPARTAN's sure know how to kill Hunters." a marine said in awe.

"come on, private, we got more to do here." Carter ordered, slapping another clip into his DMR. The large group of Marines and SPARTAN's poured through the door and immediately gunned down the first Covenant troops they saw.

"damn, I'm sure you guys are on our side!" a marine congratulated the SPARTAN's.

"cut the chatter, we still got those Jackals to worry about!" Carter yelled.

"the only thing I hate more then Jackals is Jackals, WITH FUCKING SNIPER RIFLES!" Dempsey screamed angrily. Nikolai's Pelican settled down.

"Major, I need you on that Pelican." Cmdr. Keyes said.

"Ma'am?" Soap asked.

"My Pelicans are going to start airlifting armor and reinforcements into the city. They'll need an escort that isn't afraid of a little hostile ground fire."

"Understood. I'll keep an eye on 'em. Good luck, Commander."

"take some of our Marines with you. In fact, just leave the SPARTAN's down here. We can take care of any resistance. We travel in a big enough group, we'll be easy pickings." Carter said.

"he's got a point, Commander."

"fine, bring all the marines with you, we'll need the extra manpower anyway." Keyes said. The pelican took off, leaving the SPARTAN's alone with a bunch of blood-thirsty Covenant soldiers.

"this is gonna be very fun." Emile said, pulling out his kukri, holding his knife in his right and his shotgun in his left.

"you know, Emile, most humans have a more normal definition of the word 'fun.' " Cortana joked.

"whoever said SPARTAN's were normal humans?" John asked, taking his helmet off and downing his entire bottle of vodka.

"you sure you wanna do that?" Jorge asked.

"has it ever affected my judgment before?" John replied, carelessly tossing the bottle behind him, putting his helmet back on. The SPARTAN's then unleashed all the fury they had on the Covenant, tearing through any opposition. When they finally reached Hotel Zanzibar,

"heard you guys needed some reinforcements!" Kat yelled, blasting an Elite Major with her pistol.

"glad you guys could make it! Crash site's on the other side of the hotel, it's crawling with Covenant! Follow me!" Sgt. Stacker yelled.

"holy crap, we got a whole squad of SPARTAN's with us." a wounded marine said in awe.

"there's no way we're gonna lose now." another marine replied. John and Noble team just rolled their eyes. They were getting very tired of all the fanfare about the SPARTAN's. True, they were the best soldiers in the UNSC, but they were getting extremely tired of how everyone held them to near-mythical status. They found more Covenant on the other side.

"when this war is over, I'm gonna send in my resignation!" Jun yelled, sniping an Elite.

"I don't blame you!" Richard yelled, priming a plasma grenade and sticking it to an Elite's genitals. Sucks to be that Elite. Several Warthogs armed with chain-guns roared up.

"special delivery from Commander Keyes!" the lead marine yelled. The SPARTAN's quickly jumped down and commandeered the 'Hogs.

"the highest concentration of covenant ground troops is directly below the carrier. I don't think they want you guys to get on board." Cortana said.

"that's too bad for the Covenant." Emile said, reloading his shotgun.

"gun it!" Jun yelled, manning the machine gun. The Warthogs roared towards the bridge, blasting their way through any Covenant opposition they encountered.

"hey guys, tell me something! If the bridge is all the way up there, and we're down here, how are we getting up there! Oh shit, drop pods!" Jun yelled.

"we'll figure something out!" John yelled, who was struggling on driving the warthog while shooting his rifle at the same time.

"man, the Covenant really don't want us up there." Jorge commented. After driving through more opposition, they found a large hole in a large underground tunnel.

"this tunnel leads up to the bridge. It's full of rats, if you know what I mean... But it sure beats swimming." Cortana said.

"anything beats swimming in that sludge." Kat replied. As the Warthogs roared down the tunnel,

"I've been analyzing the Covenant tactical chatter. They're surprised, confused... I don't think they expected us to be here. Not you and me...all of us...humanity, on Earth. Odd, I know, but it does help explain why they came here with such a small fleet."

"that, or this fleet is the remains of that large fleet at the Unyielding Hierophant that we didn't catch." Carter commented.

"why'd you have to say that, commander?" John asked.

"just wondering where these ships came from." the S-III innocently replied.

"don't give it another thought. That's an order." John growled. He was still the main CO of the 141. After dodging a shot from the Scarab they encountered earlier,

"we gotta get the hell outta this tunnel." John sighed.

"I've already plotted an escape route." Cortana said. Unfortunately, it was filled with Covenant transport vehicles. The SPARTAN's recognized them.

"looks like the Covenant are trying to regroup. Don't let them!" Cortana warned. The .50 cal armor-piercing bullets tore through the thick plating on the alien vehicles, tearing their pilots to shreds.

"there's the exit. Gun it!" Kat yelled. The warthogs shot out of the tunnel, arriving at the bridge. They all quickly abandoned their war machines, tumbling on the ground as they harshly landed.

"let's never do that again." Jun sighed.

"we won't." John coughed.

"well, there goes the Scarab." Jorge said.

"how the hell are we gonna get rid of that?" John sighed. Noble stared at him quizzically, their helmets removed.

"most of the time when we encountered Scarabs, they were right next to us and we had plenty of backup. Now, all our troops and equipment are off in the city." John sighed.

"here's our backup." Kat said, cocking her head at two Pelicans carrying Scorpion tanks. The tanks were disconnected; John saw MacTavish hanging on the blood tray of the Pelican's rear door.

"where's your platoon?"  
>"wasted, Major." the female marine replied.<p>

"and we will be too, if we don't get the hell outta here!"

"you hit, soldier?"  
>"n-no sir."<p>

"then listen up! Usually the good Lord works in mysterious ways. But not today! This here is 66 tons of straight up, HE spewing dee-vine intervention! If God is love, then you can call me cupid!" MacTavish yelled.

"what about that Scarab?" the female marine asked.

"we've all run the sims! They're tough, but not invincible. Stay with the SPARTAN's, they'll no what to do!" MacTavish said, popping in a cigar.

"thanks for the tank. _He_ never gets me anything." Cortana joked.

"oh, I know what the ladies like." Soap smirked, cocking the machine gun on the Pelican.

"mount up. Let's get this over with." John ordered. The SPARTAN's and Marines climbed on the two Scorpion tanks and rolled down the bridge, blasting any Covenant they encountered.

"well, that's quite a welcome party." Jorge said, reloading his machine gun. Banshees swooped down, firing their plasma cannons in an attempt to stop the tanks. The Scorpions just rolled down the bridge, blasting the Banshees away with ease.

"look out, we got Wraiths up ahead." Carter warned. They were quickly destroyed.

"where to, now?" a marine asked.

"the Kilindini Underpass. The only way to get to the Scarab." John said, driving his tank into the tunnel. They met very little resistance, until they encountered a large barrier that couldn't be blasted through.

"leave the tanks, we're going on foot." John ordered, pulling out his rifle.

"wow, I didn't know they send SPARTAN's to help us out." the female Sgt. commented.

"just stay the fuck outta our way." John angrily snarled. Grunts and Jackals popped out, lead by several Elites.

"I fucking these jackals!" Jun yelled, sniping the jackals with ease.

"just keep shooting, it'll all be over." John replied. Even though he knew the war would be over in a couple of months, even he was beginning to believe the war had no end in sight. They continued down the hall, reaching the sewer pipes. They followed them, empting out into the Kilindini Park Cultural Service Center. There were plenty of Covenant soldiers around. Even worse, the SPARTAN's were running low on ammunition.

"you know what, fuck this. Captain Keyes, request heavy saturation bombing run on the Kilindini Park Cultural Center along with surrounding areas, 55 mile radius. And we also request some Pelican dropships." John asked. The Morning Sun flew overhead, bombing the requested targets with armor-piercing 50mm cannons and high-explosive rockets and missiles. Several Pelican dropships came down to evacuate the SPARTAN's and Marines.

"where are we going, Chief?" Carter asked.

"I'm gonna get rid of that Scarab." John replied.

"Ramius didn't happen to arm this Pelican, did he?" Kat asked.

"if it came from the Morning Sun, you bet your ass he did." John replied. The Scarab came in sight. John armed all the rockets and missiles on the dropship and fired them all. These missiles came with an extra punch; they were armed with massive packages of C12 explosives, along with self-made 75mm HE charges. The Scarab went up in flames.

"bout goddamn time." John sighed, leaning back in the chair.

"looks like Regret is bugging out." MacTavish said in his command Pelican.

"not if we can help it. Get your Pelicans back on the Morning Sun, I'll be right behind you." Commander Keyes ordered. She then switched the channel to Admiral Hood.

"status?" he asked.

"the Prophet of Regret is bugging out, Admiral, request permission to engage."

"negative, Commander, I'll have Captain Keyes destroy it."

"commander, that carrier is spooling it's FTL drive! It's gonna jump inside the city!" the NAV officer yelled.

"we don't have any time, admiral!"

"you have a green light to engage!" Hood said finally.

On the Morning Sun,

"pull the ship up next to the carrier, we're not gonna lose that ship! We'll just ride the shockwave to it's destination!" Keyes yelled.

"Captain Keyes, I'm reading several SOEIV's that launched from the cruiser _Say My Name_, they're heading straight for us!" Doc Brown yelled.

"tell them to disengage right this minute! And connect me with the rest of the ship!"

"your on!"

"all hands, this is the captain, we are attempting an intro-atmosphere slipspace jump! Brace for impact, I say again, brace for immediate impact! And someone tell those ODST's to get the hell outta here; they came too late!" the captain yelled. The Covenant assault carrier entered the slipspace realm, pulling the UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun and the UNSC In Amber Clad with it. The resulting EMP shockwave disabled the HEV pods and almost all electrical systems in the city.

* * *

><p><strong>Like? don't like? please read and review!<strong>


	8. Chapter 7

**I don't own anything except Dr. Brown, the Morning Sun, and Major Bishop. Also, the 45th Longsword Bombadiers is mine. Everything else belongs to Bungie and the guys who make CoD.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 7<p>

October 20, 2552

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

Slipstream Space

"alright, we managed to follow Regret's Carrier. But where is it gonna exit, and when?" Captain Keyes asked.

"you want suggestions?" Brown asked.

"I'm all ears at this point."

"let our people get some sleep. Also, slow this thing down considerably. I don't really find any rush to catching up to Regret. We'll find him sooner or later and kill him."

"alright. have both ships stand down to combat alert two, let our people get some sleep. But if that carrier so much as twitches in our direction, I wanna be ready." Keyes said.

"captain…." Brown asked. The veteran turned around.

"yes, Dr. Brown?"  
>"do you think we made the right choice jumping after that carrier when all those ODST's were jumping right at us? The EMP wave will definitely have short-circuited their pods and have them crashing to the ground. And at that height, there's no way they could've survived." Brown said.<p>

"if there was a chance to stay behind and rescue those troopers, I would've done it. But considering the current circumstances, we never had a chance. And I'm probably gonna go to hell for what I'm gonna say next, but if I was stuck in that situation again, I would order that jump." Keyes said, leaving the bridge. Brown chuckled at that as he drank some scotch; they did have a chance to stay behind and rescue those soldiers, just use the PFC and travel back. But to do that while in slipspace was 100% suicide; not to mention they were still trailing after Regret.

"no. those guys are own their own now, just like us." he muttered to himself as he began powering down several ships systems to conserve power. Keyes then popped back in.

"just one question, Doctor. Taking in account of where the carrier is going, and our current velocity in slipspace, when do you think we'll catch up to and kill Regret?"  
>"this is just an estimation: I would say it's gonna take us up to two and a half to three weeks. Even with the Forerunner reactor we have powering our ship, we're still slower then Covenant ships in slipspace."<p>

"thank you, Doctor." Keyes sighed, leaving the bridge.

October 20, 2552

UNSC Home Fleet

UNSC Say My Name

Earth, Sol System

"are you sure this is gonna work?" Dunn asked.

"the Chief wouldn't have ordered us to do this if he didn't think it wouldn't work. All we have to do is just wait here and wait for the Troopers to arrive." Shepherd whispered, lighting his cigar. General Shepherd, Sgt. Foley, Cpl. Dunn, and Pvt. Ramirez were on the UNSC Say My Name, clustered around one of the holodecks that showed the battle raging around Earth.

"you think they've would've brought in more ships to defend Earth." Ramirez said.

"we did all we could, private. Can't ask for more than that. If it wasn't for Captain Keyes sending out that message, we'd probably be in worse shape then we are now." Foley replied.

"so, what's the plan?" Dunn asked.

"the Chief said we basically follow the ODST's as they jump down. More specifically, Captain Dare's team. That's all he said, never gave up any more information then that." Shepherd said, taking a drag on his cigar.

"that's it? Why do I have the feeling he's hiding information from us?" Dunn asked.

"you're not the only one, corporal." Shepherd replied, crossing his arms.

"what about our pods?" Foley asked.

"Cortana had that covered; she requested that four HEV pods with our names inscribed on them be sent to this ship. And she also wrote that it came from HIGHCOM, so no one would question the order." Shepherd said.

"from HIGHCOM? Are you kidding me, General? If it came from HIGHCOM, don't you think the ship's captain would second-guess those orders, wonder why HIGHCOM would want to send some measly HEV pods to a cruiser on the eve of a major mission to defend Earth?" Foley asked.

"I don't question my orders, sergeant, I just receive them and follow them to the best of my abilities, I suggest you keep that in your head!" Shepherd snapped, tossing his burning cigar on the holo-table. That's when the door started to open.

"fuck. Hide in the pods, quickly!" Shepherd whispered. The four USA Marines quickly left the table, leaving Shepherd's cigar. Dutch, Romeo, Mickey, and the Rookie walked in. The Rookie immediately climbed into a pod to grab some ZZZ's. The one thing that stood out was that their armor looked different.

"those aren't the ones we fought with, right?" Dunn quietly whispered.

"no. Shit, they haven't merged with themselves yet. What the fuck are they doing?" Shepherd quietly wondered.

"Eddie and Vera are probably arguing with each other, seems that's all they do these days." Foley whispered.

"looks like the Navy put up a good fight." Mickey said.

"course they did. It's Earth." Dutch chastised.

"hell, better late then never."

"why don't you show some respect, Romeo?"  
>"just saying, Dutch. They missed one."<p>

"nah, they left that one for us. Hey, what's with the cigar?" Dutch asked, picking up Shepherd's cigar. Shepherd quietly pulled the bolt back on his M4A1 assault rifle and leveled it at Dutch's head, aiming from the waist. Foley, Dunn, and Ramirez could only watch, wondering if Shepherd would pull the trigger. Suddenly, the lights cut out, plunging the room in total blackness.

"okay, what's going on here?" Dutch asked. Suddenly, several bright lights filled the room.

"now they merge with their past selves!" Shepherd yelled angrily. The lights then came back on.

"you mind telling us when you were gonna plan that?" Foley asked, evidently very ticked off.

"didn't think we had to post a memo." Dutch said rather haughtily.

"watch it, lance corporal. I almost blew your head off just a minute ago." Shepherd growled, raising his M4 rifle and grabbing his cigar. The lights began to blink and a klaxon alarm started blaring.

"that's our signal, find your seats and get set to dance. Romeo, keep your sniper rifle." Buck ordered.

"how the hell am I gonna use this inside a Covie ship?" the sniper asked.

"I got a feeling we won't be fighting inside that carrier on this mission." Foley said, climbing in his pod. That wasn't the most re-assuring feelings the ODST's could have at that moment.

"if John-117 gives us any strange orders, you know he's hiding something." Shepherd said, taking another drag.

"what'd he say to you?" Veronica asked.

"all he said was to just follow the ODST's as they drop down. More specifically, your orders, captain Dare."

"doesn't that sound odd?" Dunn asked.

"with the Chief, you never know what he's up to. So, what orders do you got in that ONI brain of yours?" Shepherd asked. Veronica just gave a smile that made Shepherd wonder if she was hiding something or just playing with him.

"sorry General, but that's classified."

"I'm sure it is." he muttered, climbing in his pod. The pods all rotated out, Buck and Dare got on the comm.

"okay, latest intel reports Covenant troops massing near the carrier." Dare said.

"Captain Keyes managed to drive them back?" Dunn asked.

"we're not going to find out way up here." Veronica replied.

"we are dropping into hell, troopers! Time to grow a pair!" Buck yelled. The pods launched and they soared past the wreckage of a destroyed Halcyon cruiser.

"the Navy sure got it's ass owned." Romeo said.

"hey Romeo, remember when I said to shut your mouth? Consider it a standing order." Buck snapped.

"damn, that's one big ship." Foley said in awe. Right below them, Regret's Carrier hovered over New Mombassa. The UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun was slowly trailing it. That gave them a good view of how large the super carrier was compared to the Covenant carrier.

"captain? Fifteen klicks off the deck." Shepherd remarked.

"stand by to adjust trajectory. On my mark." Dare ordered.

"what did she just say?" Dutch yelled.

"mark!" the female ODST ordered. The pods then veered off towards a new course.

"captain Dare, maybe it hasn't occurred to you, but we're way off course!" Foley yelled.

"we're heading exactly where I need to go."

"but we're gonna miss the carrier!" Dunn replied.

"shit! Radiation!" Dutch yelled. A wave of energy flowed over the Covenant carrier. No one noticed yet the UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun and the UNSC In Amber Clad were flying awfully close to the Covenant carrier.

"did the Covenant just set off a nuke?" Mickey yelled. A slipspace opening formed in front of the carrier, which wasn't good.

"no. The carrier's going to jump! It's a slipspace rupture! You need to-" Dare began but was cut off when the three ships flew into the field, causing a massive EMP blast to be sent out.

"EMP! Losing power!" Dutch yelled.

"stabilize, then pop your chutes! We're going in hard!" Shepherd ordered.

"what the hell's going on?" Ramirez yelled, who had kept his comm off.

"don't know, don't care! Just find a spot to land, pray that you're alive, and make sure you still have your balls!" Dunn yelled.

"easy for you to say! I think my balls actually shrunk back into my body!" Ramirez yelled. The falling pods screamed toward the ground at an unbelievable rate and slammed into the ground, separating the squad from each other.

"well this sucks." Ramirez gasped to himself before he blacked out.

October 20, 2552

Tayari Plaza, Sector 5, New Mombassa, East Africa, Earth

Gunnery Sergeant Edward Buck

"…squad, what's your status? You still with me Buck?" Veronica asked.

"yeah, just gimme a second." the veteran sergeant said, wondering how the hell his pod landed upside down.

"I hit rather hard, my hatch won't open. What about yours?"

Buck hit the switch and the hatch opened up, dumping the sergeant out on his back.

"works perfectly." he said sarcastically.

"right. When your done fooling around, I could use some help over here."

"did I do something wrong? Because the only thing I definitely regret… was not knowing you were a spook when we very first met. I would've been a lot less charming guy." Buck said, feeling very dizzy as he stood up.

"that's what I miss most about you, Edward, the way your mouth moves faster then your brain. Look, don't start about my job. We both agreed to end it."

"that was years ago, Veronica, before we went back to stop the war. So I'm… a little… fuzzy… on the details!" Buck grunted as he ripped out his MA5C rifle.

"you really don't remember what you asked me, do you?"  
>"I remember not getting any answer. And you still haven't told me."<p>

"say again, Buck, you're breaking up."

"I said stay put! I'm coming towards you!" he yelled, spotting a Phantom fly overhead.

"we missed our LZ, so this grid will be packed with Covenant. Be careful."

"thanks for the concern." he replied sarcastically.

"you won't be much of a rescue if you're dead." she replied coldly. Buck just sighed as he opened fire on the Covenant troops below him. The brute leader spotted him and opened fire with his Brute Plasma Rifle. Buck quickly ducked and waited for the fire to calm down. Priming several grenades, he quickly tossed them over the railing and sprayed the enemy platoon with gunfire. After dispatching the last few grunts, he reloaded his rifle and took off down the road. He found several marines hiding behind a destroyed Warthog. He also found what destroyed the 'hog: an HEV pod with the words Sgt. Foley printed on the front. Buck smiled, he found at least one member of his squad.

"Buck."

"Foley. You find anyone else?"  
>"nope. For all we know, it's just us. You know, some of these buildings here are open. I suggest we take the flank and ambush 'em on the side." the veteran African-American sergeant planned out, cocking his old SCAR-H rifle.<p>

"sounds like a good plan. You wanna take point?" Buck asked.

"not really, but it appears I don't have a choice." Foley sighed as he walked inside the building first. They saw what appeared to be blast marks from Covenant weaponry. Mostly Brute Spike Rifles and Covenant Plasma Rifles.

"what the hell happened here?" Buck asked. When they got to the balcony,

"there they are. Smoke 'em." Foley whispered. The two sergeants opened fire on the small Covenant platoon, providing the distraction the marines needed to push forward.

"huh, I wonder what's with all the dead Elites. You don't think…." Foley began.

"what?" Buck asked.

"remember when the Arbiter said about how the Elites split from the Covenant? He never said anything about the Brutes killing the Elites during that split."

"we'll ask him when he returns." the two sergeants continued through the nearby buildings, killing any Covenant they saw. Their skill didn't go unnoticed to the UNSC Marines.

"who the hell are those two?"  
>"ODST's. They're the best of the best and crazy as hell."<p>

Those were some of the comments on Sgt. Edward Buck and Sgt. David Foley as the two tore through the Covenant opposition, gathering any Marines they could find. They soon had a larger-than-average Marine fire team with them.

"aw shit, we got Jackals in the courtyard!" a marine yelled.

"use your grenades, make sure they land in the middle!" Buck yelled, tossing a frag.

"you can also shoot their arms off, aim for the notches at the sides!" Foley yelled.

"I know how to kill a Jackal, jackass!" a Marine retorted.

"fuck you, asshole!" Foley yelled back, spraying an unshielded Jackal with his SCAR-H.

"Buck, location!" Veronica yelled.

"we're almost there, what's wrong?" Foley yelled.

"I got multiple hostiles closing on my location. Listen carefully, if I don't make it…."

"no! hang on, we'll be right there! Just hang on!" Buck yelled.

"too late, they've spotted me!" the comm then cut off.

"Veronica? VERONICA, TALK TO ME! Dammit." Buck swore.

"we gotta keep moving, gunnery sergeant!" a female marine yelled.

"right. Okay, follow me! Watch the garbage cans, the rooftops, any place a Covie might hide!" Buck yelled.

"roger that, sergeant!" the marines yelled back. The door opened up to reveal two Hunters stepping out.

"aw come on!" a marine cried out.

"five years until retirement, five more years until retirement." Foley whispered to himself beneath his breath. He pulled out his grenade launcher attachment, slapped it underneath the barrel, loaded a 'special' grenade and fired. The 'special' grenade was the product of Makarov and his men in an attempt to create a more powerful grenade the M203 launchers could fire. The grenade was a High Explosive Armor Piercing Incendiary round. The warhead was actually a form of napalm highly compressed mixed with TNT. When it collided, it set whatever it hit on fire and blasted a hole into whatever it hit. The barrel of the launcher was more along the lines of the worlds smallest Gauss cannon. The high rate of the grenade fired allowed it to kill Hunters with relative ease, provided you actually hit them in the right spot. So when Foley fired his grenade launcher, the first Hunter died almost instantly. The second was smarter and lowered his shield. Foley _might_ be able to blast through the shield, but to do so would take time and use up most of his grenades. So he opted for the frags and tossed them behind the monster. After the second Hunter died,

"let's get a move on, people!" Buck yelled, reloading his MA5C.

"what kind of grenades did you use, man?" a Marine asked.

"the best of the best." Foley said, reloading his launcher and rifle. After dispatching more Covenant soldiers, they soon found Cpt. Dare's pod. Stuck at the bottom of Tayari Plaza.

"Attention traveler! Lost item can be claimed on… lower levels." the Superintendent rang out. No one paid any attention, however.

"there she is. How to get down." Buck sighed. After dispatching the grunts shooting at the pod,

"form a perimeter around the pod, no one gets in our out!" Buck yelled.

"I gotcha, I'm right here….." Buck sighed as he wrenched the pod hatch open. Unfortunately, Veronica wasn't there. She was gone.

"what the hell…." Buck sighed. An Engineer then popped up behind him.

"aw shit, bring it down!" the marines yelled, spraying the alien with gunfire.

"shit!" Buck yelled as the Engineer exploded, sending Dare's helmet flying.

"what the hell are Engineers doing here on Earth?" Buck asked. A lone ODST walked up carrying a sniper rifle.

"Romeo, you got your ears on?" Foley asked. The sniper just shrugged.

"oh, I get it. Permission to speak, smartass." Buck sighed angrily.

"no, I don't know what they're doing here. But whatever it was, it might've greased your ass, just like it did the captain."

"yeah right. Whenever we fought engineers, they hardly fight at all. Just curl up and die. Remember Reach?" Foley asked.

"how do you explain the helmet?" Romeo asked. Foley didn't answer.

"hear from Dutch, Mickey?"  
>"nope."<p>

"Shepherd, Dunn?"

Romeo shook his head.

"the rookie and Ramirez?"

"nothing."

"alright, we need to get outta this crap. Link up with the B-NET, see where they landed. Our drones must've seen where they hit."

"so where popping smoke on the ladies mission? She ever tell you two what she wanted?" Romeo asked incuriously.

"no, never did. That don't matter now, all I care about is getting as many marines outta the city. Even you." Foley said. All the present Marines reloaded their weapons and started humping out of the war-torn city.

October 20, 2552

Uplift Nature Reserve, New Mombassa, East Africa, Earth

Two ODST's climbed out of their pods and stumbled onto the hot sand as two F-99 UCAV's roared overhead.

"good hunting boys, but I'm keeping my boots on the ground." Dunn sighed, pulling out his M4A1 grenadier rifle.

"you alright?" Dutch asked, shouldering his SPARTAN Laser.

"I'm fine, I just wanna find the enemy." Dunn said, cocking his rifle.

"roger that." the veteran ODST said. The two headed up a small hill that lead into a large opening where several Marines were fighting Covenant heavy armor.

"troopers, over here! Help us secure are Warthog! Those Covies are killing us!" a Marine yelled. Dunn and Dutch gripped the side of the warthog and lifted up. Due to the Element 115 in their bodies, it gave them near super-human strength that most ordinary humans could never achieve.

"thanks, soldier!" a Marine yelled, grabbing the turret. Dutch hopped in the driver's seat while Dunn grabbed shotgun.

"here, use this! Take care of those tanks!" Dutch yelled, handing his SPARTAN Laser to Cpl. Dunn.

"watch those Choppers, take them head on and we'll be chewed up!" the Marine yelled, firing the mini-gun.

"got it!" Dunn yelled, firing the laser and destroying a Wraith. After they dispatched of all the enemy armor,

"let's get the hell outta here!" Dunn yelled.

"Colonel? Sector's clear and we found some backup!"

"say again, Marine? I got drones overhead and ONI brass yelling in my ear!"

"ODST's Miles and Dunn reporting for duty, sir!" Dunn yelled.

"nice of you two to drop by! Head to the next section of the park, to my second platoon's location! They're taking heavy casualties, need immediate assistance."

"roger that, we're Oscar mike!" Dunn yelled.

"where's the rest of your team, trooper?"

"scattered, dead. I don't know." Dutch growled.

"that's too bad. We're gonna need all the men we can get."

They roared to another section of the park, where they encountered several Ghosts, Shade turrets, and a lot of Brutes.

"kill them all before they warn their leaders!" the Marine yelled.

"what do you think I'm doing?" Dunn snarled, firing his SCAR-H rifle. After smashing through the Shade turrets and destroying the Ghosts,

"perfect, keep going!" Dutch screamed, flooring it.

"Trooper, you're almost at second platoon's location. Give 'em a hand and push toward the primary objective!"

"what _is_ the objective, Colonel?" Dunn snapped.

"you know the Covenant carrier that slipped away from the city? We need to secure its old LZ. Snatch a Tier One asset!" the Colonel replied. When they arrived,

"Troopers, this is second platoon, see what you can do about those Wraiths!" a Marine yelled. Dunn grabbed a 'sticky bomb', which was actually one of Makarov's satchel bombs coated with a sticky substance the plasma grenades use, and threw it on a Wraith. It was raining Wraith pieces soon after that.

"where's the colonel?" Dutch yelled, spinning the warthog around.

"he's near the Covenant LZ! Once we take out this armor, we'll roll across the bridge to his location!" the Marine yelled back. As the small Warthog convoy roared across the bridge.

"look out! The elevator's collapsing! INCOMING!" Dunn yelled. Massive pieces of the elevator flew all over the place.

"HOLY SHIT!" Dunn screamed.

"what's going on?"

"THE SLIPSPACE REACTOR CAUSED THE ELEVATOR TO COLLAPSE! GET THE FUCK OFF THE BRIDGE!" Dunn screamed.

"Colonel, what's going on?" Dutch yelled.

"all units, clear the area. Before more debris falls down…." the Colonel coughed.

"colonel? Sir? Dammit, he's gone. We gotta get the hell outta here, soldiers!" the Marine yelled.

"PUT THAT IN A MEMO AND TITLE IT SHIT I ALREADY NOW!" Dunn and Dutch screamed angrily. They soon arrived at the old LZ where they slaughtered the Covenant troops stationed there.

"drive through the hole in the wall!"

Without second thought, Dutch floored the Warthog through the hole.

"I'M NOW OFFICIAL AFRAID OF HEIGHTS!" Dunn screamed as the Warthog flew towards the New Mombassa city that was dangerously coming close towards them.

"SON OF A BITCH!" the Marine yelled, hopping out. He died upon impact. Dunn and Dutch stayed in the Warthog and survived. When it slammed on the ground, they immediately bailed out and caused the Warthog to crash against the wall.

"uh… Lord? Dunn and I never trained to be pilots. Tell me we don't have any more flying to do today." Dutch growled in pain. The Warthog then exploded.

"amen to that, Lord." Dunn sighed, picking himself up.

"let's get outta here." the two soldiers picked themselves up and got outta there.

October 20, 2552

Kizingo Boulevard, New Mombassa, Earth

_Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit! Why the hell did I sign up for this?_ Mickey thought to himself as he narrowly dodged a Wraith plasma shot.

"trooper, get in the fucking tank before the Wraith destroys it!" a Marine yelled.

"wait for me!" Mickey yelled. The lone ODST ran towards the Scorpion tank and hopped in the cockpit.

"taste heavy metal, jackass." he sighed, turning the turret and blowing the Wraith to pieces.

"ah, good work trooper! Covenant's been rolling us back block by block. Every Marine in the city is headed for a rally point near the Naval Intelligence building, you oughta come with us." a Marine yelled.

"sure, as long as I get to drive the tank!" Mickey laughed. After he grabbed as much Marines as the tank could hold, he turned it around and began roaring through the streets, blasting any Covenant he found.

"we got a squad of Marines pinned down in the next plaza. It's packed with Covenant, so once you start, don't stop moving!"

"as if I need to be told that." Mickey muttered beneath his breath. After clearing the plaza of Covenant opposition,

"so, where to next?" Mickey asked.

"everyone pile on, we're pushing to the rally point!" the Marine yelled.

"I spotted a whole column of hostile armor heading to that direction." a female Hispanic Marine warned.

"don't worry, this ODST we got? He's an artist with high explosives! Trooper, head through the doors to Kizingo Boulevard, fasted way to the rally point!"

The doors opened up to reveal Kizingo Boulevard. There were several Gauss cannons ready to fire.

"Gauss Turret's hot, ready fire!"

"hold your fire, soldier, wait till they're in the kill zone!" Dunn yelled.

"they've spotted me! I gotta take the shot now!"

He never had to worry because Mickey drove the tank into the Boulevard, blasting away at enemy vehicles.

"Dunn, what are you doing up there?" Mickey asked.

"I'm outta rockets, kill that Wraith!" Dutch yelled. After the Wraith was destroyed,

"okay, dismount and come over here!" Dunn yelled. The Marines abandoned the tank and ran up the hill.

"shit, watch the door!" Dutch yelled. The door opened up to reveal a small platoon of Covenant soldiers. After they were riddled with bullets,

"the Covenant dropped behind us, they must know this is our rally point!" Dutch yelled.

"that's fucking great!" Mickey replied.

"we got more ammo and weapons on the high ground, move your asses!" Dunn yelled. Several Phantoms began landing reinforcements.

"shit, we got company!" a Marine yelled.

"hunker down and start shooting!" Dunn replied. Due to all the Wraiths, however, that was much more harder then they realized. And because Jackals started running over the bridges, they had to split their forces.

"Dunn, use your grenade launcher!" Mickey yelled, referring to his M203.

"why don't you use your rocket launcher instead?" Dunn yelled, firing several grenades at the flanking Jackals. After several long minutes of continuous fighting, the tanks were destroyed and the Covenant soldiers were dead.

"you hear from Foley, Buck?" Dunn asked.

"nope. Romeo or Shepherd neither. I got nothing." Mickey said.

"well, guess it's just us." Dunn said.

"my vote, hole up and wait for back up." Mickey said. The door then opened to reveal an NMPD officer.

"oh, thank god. Does one of you know how to use explosives?" he asked.

"your vote, just got overruled." Dutch said.

"oh…." Mickey sighed.

October 20, 2552

ONI Alpha Site, New Mombassa, Earth

At the ONI Alpha Site, Mickey, Dunn and Dutch were busy arming HE charges on the bridge.

"you finished with those bombs?" Dutch yelled.

"hey, you wanna do this? Be my guest. But this ain't a job you wanna rush." Mickey said, arming another charge.

"how's it going?" Dunn asked.

"signal's good! Arm the other detonators and pull back to me!" the NMPD officer yelled.

"come on, tough guy, we gotta blow this bridge!" Mickey yelled.

"what about those tanks?" Dutch yelled.

"forget them! Arm the other charges and get outta here!" Dunn yelled. After they quickly armed the rest of the bombs they ran back to behind the large barriers.

"come on, SUPERINTENDENT, unlock the keypad!" a Marine frantically yelled.

"KEEP IT CLEAN! RESPECT PUBLIC PROPERTY!" the SUPERINTENDENT AI responded.

"you know what, fuck this! I'll detonate it myself!" Dunn yelled, pulling out a detonator and blasting the bridge to pieces. The Covenant responded by sending Phantom dropships to land troops behind them.

"fire more years to retirement, five more years to retirement…." Dunn whispered to himself as he reloaded his rifle. All the marines ran up the hill, taking positions to protect themselves while others manned the HMG's to shoot any Covenant that followed them. And they did, by the waves.

"I'm all outta grenades! This sucks!" Dunn yelled, firing his last M203 grenade.

"more phantoms, look sharp!" Mickey yelled.

"in the base, right fucking now!" Dutch screamed. When they ran inside the main room, they found several explosives placed all around the main foyer. They also spotted two HMG and a large pile of ammunition.

"hurry up men, check those charges!" the NMPD sergeant yelled.

"wait, more bombs?" Dunn yelled.

"yeah, what gives?" Dutch asked.

"I have orders to deny the enemy access to this equipment stationed in this building. You don't like it, jump your butts back up to orbit!"

"the only thing I don't like is that our butts are currently inside this facility." Mickey snapped.

"they're cutting through the door!"

"settle down, people, find some cover! Some one man those turrets!" the sergeant yelled.

"here they come!" Dunn yelled. the doors blew open; the Covenant were met with blistering machine gun fire. Dunn kept swearing to himself that he used up all his grenades.

"hey Dunn, you got any grenades?" Mickey yelled, firing his rocket launcher.

"I'm all out!"

"that's too bad, just keep shooting!" Dutch yelled, mashing the triggers down on the HMG. After about two and a half hours of fighting, which felt like forever to the humans, the Covenant stopped coming.

"alright, everyone in the elevator, I put enough charges in this shaft to blow this building twice!" the sergeant yelled.

"okay then, transfer the detonation codes to my COM. If anyone's gonna be taking this place it, it's gonna be me." Mickey determined.

"you know, I like blowing stuff up, but this shit sucks, man." Dunn sighed. As the elevator began rising, Drones began flying out, firing their plasma pistols.

"where the hell did these buggers come from?" Dunn asked, firing his rifle.

"underground tunnels are filled with the damn things!" the sergeant yelled.

"finally, a good reason to blow this place up!" Mickey sighed.

"you said it, Mickey!" Dunn replied. When the elevator reached the top, they were greeted by several Jump Pack Brutes.

"I FUCKING HATE BRUTES!" Dunn screamed, firing his rifle a Brute. Said Brute exchanged the favor with his spike rifle, causing the former United States Ranger to duck. The brute chuckled as he reloaded his weapon.

"hey, you want me? I'm right here, you big dumb ape!" Dunn yelled, challenging the large warrior. The Brute roared in anger and charge the column where Dunn was hiding behind. Dunn quickly jumped out and fired off one last grenade from his launcher. The brute blew to pieces, spraying him and the fellow NMPD officers with blood.

"I thought you were outta grenades!" Dutch hollered.

"guess I just forget." Dunn snarled. An NMPD Pelican soon landed on the rooftop.

"get us the hell outta here." Dunn snarled, collapsing on the chair and sighing heavily.

"hey, you fellas know a Gunnery Sergeant Buck and Sergeant Foley?" a police officer asked.  
>"course we do." Mickey said, removing his helmet.<p>

"alright, patching 'em through."

"glad to find you boys safe and sound." Buck said.

"right back at you, Gunny. You need a pickup?" Dutch asked.

"long as your offering, we're in the police HQ." Foley replied.

"can you get us there?" Dunn asked.

"yes sir."

"good. We'll meet you on top." Buck said.

As the Pelican flew away,

"what?" Dunn asked when Mickey nudged him. The veteran ODST pointed to the ONI building and pressed the detonator. As the building erupted in a brilliant ball of explosive flame,

"this day ain't turning out so bad after all." Mickey slightly chuckled. Dunn, however, felt the exact opposite.

"like the chief always says, don't get cocky. It'll get you killed."

October 20, 2552

NMPD HQ, New Mombassa, Africa, Earth

At the top of the NMPD HQ, two ODST's and a United States Ranger burst through a door, their weapons out in the open.

"anything?" Foley asked.

"clear." Romeo responded.

"hey Rookie, you out there? Ramirez? Respond, both of you! That's an order!" Buck yelled as the three soldiers began walking to the landing pad.

"give it up, Gunny. Even if he ain't dead, he's lost in that soup. Our comms can't cut through that." Romeo said.

"what, give up? What if it were you down there?" Buck asked.

"just saying, I ain't dead."

"you're a real piece of work, Romeo." Foley snarled. The NMPD Pelican soon arrived.

"welcome aboard ladies. First stop: anywhere but this hell-hole." Dunn stated sarcastically. Two Covenant Banshees followed them and shot the Pelican down.

"we're losing her, I can't hold it!" Dutch screamed.

"Mickey, Dunn! Status report! Dammit. Alive or dead, we're pulling them out! You hear me?" Foley yelled at Romeo.

"make some noise, Romeo, we got your back." Buck said softly as he cocked his rifle.

"so what about those Covenant we side-stepped?" the sniper asked.

"now we get to kill them." Foley growled. As they ran up a flight of stairs,

"thanks for picking such a tall building. I'm really digging these stairs." Romeo said sarcastically.

"you ever get tired of bitching, Romeo?" the two sergeants snapped.

"you ever get tired of busting my balls?"  
>"touché." Foley replied. When they got to the first courtyard,<p>

"eat this!" Foley yelled, tossing a plasma grenade.

"that did it, shoot and scoot! Romeo, snipe those bastards!" Buck yelled. The three soldiers quickly cleared the courtyard and ran to the next one.

"scavenge the bodies for any ammo, they won't need it." Foley said as they passed several dead bodies. That meant only Buck and Romeo could use their ammo, Foley used a SCAR-H rifle. As they ran outside, a Jackal sniper spotted them. Several rounds hit them, but the shielding prevented them from dying.

"Romeo, hit that sniper!" Foley yelled, firing his rifle at a grunt. A Brute threw a plasma grenade which landed on Foley. It landed on the shields, but since that never happened to him before, he had no idea what to do.

"aw shit, someone get it off!" he yelled. The grenade went off, sending him flying. To him, it was the equivalent of a flash bang right next to his hear. The shielding from his Kevlar vest momentarily went down, leaving him vulnerable.

"Foley, you alright? We gotta get moving!" Romeo yelled, picking the sergeant up and carrying him to the next door.

"Gunny, we're down on a rooftop northeast to your location."

"okay, hang tight! We're coming to you." Buck replied. After fighting through one last courtyard,

"Gunny, we've moved one of the construction cranes; made a bridge to our location." the bridge was nothing more then large pieces of very long girders.

"that's the bridge? You've gotta be kidding me." Romeo sighed.

"quit your complaining and get moving." Foley growled, rubbing his head.

"nice of you to wake up." Romeo smirked.

"watch it, I'll push you off the girders myself." Foley threatened. One look at his face meant that Foley really meant it.

"let's go!" Buck yelled, running across the girders. After a near miss with two Banshees,

"what's the sitrep?" Foley asked as they eliminated the last of the Covenant.

"we lost the pilot on impact, bird's destroyed, Covenant keep attacking us…." Dunn sounded off.

"so in other words a normal day for the 141?" Foley asked.  
>"pretty much." Dutch said, reloading his SMG.<p>

"alright, pick a turret and conserve ammo." Buck yelled, picking up a dismounted HMG. The Covenant began their attack again. Wave after wave of soldiers kept coming at them.

"do we have any grenades?" a police officer asked, reloading his BR55 rifle.

"WE'RE ALL OUT!" Dutch, Mickey, Dunn, Foley, Romeo, and Buck screamed angrily.

"we could really use some Wunderwaffe's right about now!" Dunn yelled.

"I'm not in the mood to fight zombies at the moment!" Buck yelled.

"CHIEFTAN, SCATTER!" Foley screamed as another Phantom dropped off a lone Brute. His first swing with his Gravity Hammer killed several NMPD officers on the first impact. The second swing sent Romeo flying into a large pole. The Chieftain raised his hammer for the final blow but was blocked by Romeo's rifle, bending it. It also pierced his lung. Gasping for air, the Chieftain ripped the ruined rifle off his hammer and tossed it away. Buck suddenly jumped on the monster's back and repeatedly stabbed its neck with his knife. After multiple stabs. Dunn and Dutch body slammed the Brute into the ground, killing it and pinning Buck underneath.

"get. This. Thing. Off. Of. Me." he ordered. After helping Edward out from under the Brute, Romeo began coughing up blood and wheezing rather violently.

"how bad?" Foley asked.

"not… not good man." Romeo sighed.

"we'll get you outta here." Dunn said.

"not by air, we're not." Dutch said, motioning to the destroyed Pelican.

"it's alright. I know another way out." Buck said, hoisting the wounded soldier on his shoulder.

"stock up on ammo, they won't be need it." Foley ordered.

October 20, 2552

Kikowani Station, New Mombassa, East Africa, Earth

"hang on, we're almost there." Buck said to the wounded sniper on his shoulder. The Marine fire team, consisting of 4 ODST's and 2 United States Rangers humped into Kikowani Station.

"put me down, put me down for a sec…" Romeo wheezed.

"Dunn, gimme the medkit." Buck ordered while he set the wounded sniper down.

"what's wrong with him?" Dutch asked.

"he's got a punctured lung, he can't breath." Dunn said, filling his lung with BioFoam. Romeo began breathing normally again, if only for a short time.

"better?" Buck asked.

"so what's the plan?"  
>"Trains ran underground to the old city. We'll find one of the tunnels; walk on outta here."<p>

"you gonna carry me all the way, sweetheart?" Romeo asked.

"now that your feeling better, you can hump on your own two feet." Foley said. A Phantom then roared overhead.

"get the door, quickly!" Foley whispered. Dutch immediately hit the switch. After getting their weapons ready,

"um, guys? You're gonna wanna see this." Mickey said slowly over the comm. Walking into the station, they soon found what he was looking it: the tunnels were flooded.

"this means we're fucked, right?" Dunn sighed.

"not yet." Buck said, pointing at a nearby Phantom.

"what about the Phantom?" Dutch asked.

"we're gonna steal that ride, fly outta the city. Okay it's landing, now's our chance! Mickey, you and Dunn are with me!" Buck yelled.

"I hate my job." Dunn sighed. As the three soldiers ran towards the dropship,

"Gunny, I can fly a Pelican but a Phantom? It's been years since I ran a simulation!" Mickey protested.

"let's see what you remember!" Dunn yelled, firing his rifle.

"aw shit, more of those floating squids! Should we shoot 'em?" Mickey asked, spotting more Engineers.

"Remember Reach?" Buck asked.

"yeah, at Reach, we had a bunch of heavily armed Huey choppers and a bunch of trigger-happy SPARTAN's with us! We don't have that, Gunny!"

"I meant to shoot the damn aliens!" Buck snarled. After eliminating the Covenant squad,

"Mickey, Dunn, up the lift! Kill the pilot!"

The two soldiers stepped in the grav lift and shot up inside the Phantom. After tossing the dead Brute out,

"okay, cabin secure. Flight controls read green across the board….. Well, purple. But she's good to go.. I think…." Mickey said, not so sure if he could fly the Phantom.

"alright, go pick everyone else up. I'll take a Banshee and give you support." Buck said, grabbing a Banshee. As the flew across the tunnel, a large CCS-Battlecruiser flew overhead with dozens of Banshees closely following it.

"what do you see up there, Gunny?" Foley asked.

"whole lot of Covenant. All scattered around that slipspace crater. I wonder what they're doing."

"I bet Captain Dare would know." Dunn said.

"yeah, I bet she would." Buck said softly.

"Buck, we need that door open. See if you can't-aw shit, Banshees coming through!" Mickey yelled.

"that's where we're going! Take 'em out!" Buck yelled. After shooting down the enemy Banshee's, the commandeered Banshee and Phantom flew through the door into a tunnel where they found themselves being shot at by a Wraith.

"Gunny, take care of that tank!" Dutch yelled. After several Fuel Cannon bursts destroyed the tank, the next door opened up to reveal a massive opening where a Phantom was dropping off a Huragok Recharge Station.

"well, looks like their dropping off a squid house." Foley said.

"gimme an angle, I'm gonna burn it to the ground." Romeo sighed. After destroying the station,

"that's right, you damn aliens. Doesn't feel so good, doesn't it?" Dunn sighed heavily.

"well like the good book says, payback is a bitch." Dutch said, firing his plasma turret.

"does it really say that?" Foley said.

"I'm paraphrasing, you heathen!" Dutch snapped.

"cut the chatter, we got keep moving." Buck ordered. The next door opened up to reveal, yet again, another Phantom carrying a squid house.

"shoot the squiddies!" Mickey yelled. After shooting their way through more Covenant, they encountered another problem. The door wouldn't open.

"alright, I'll get on foot, try and open it from the other side!" Buck yelled. Ditching the Banshee, he ran on foot, killing any Covenant he saw. After opening both doors, he ran onto a large platform were more Banshees were parked. Stealing one, he took off in the air and began systematically killing any Grunts he saw that might cause him trouble.  
>"troopers, I got bad news."<p>

"what, you really are gonna make us walk outta here?" Romeo sighed.

"we got a Scarab on the far side, right by our exit!"

"this is the best mission ever." Romeo sighed.

"quit your complaining Romeo, I've had just about enough of it!" Foley yelled.

"yeah, make me!"

The sound of a SCAR-H assault rifle being cocked was heard over the comm.

"I can shoot you right now if you'd like." Foley growled.

"HEY! WE CAN SHOOT EACH OTHER LATER, RIGHT NOW, WE GOTTA TAKE CARE OF THAT SCARAB!" Buck hollered.

"this ain't over." Foley said. After assaulting the Scarab along with all the AA-Wraiths and Grunts assigned to protect it, the last of the doors opened up as the Scarab blew.

"yeah! Burn, motherfuckers, burn!" Dunn and Dutch yelled happily. They flew into the last tunnel which was filled with Huragok Recharge Stations.

"aw hell, we hit the jackpot. Squiddie central." Buck sighed, firing at the stations.

"take 'em out, Gunny! Everyone hang on, this is gonna be rough!" Mickey declared. The resulting chain-reaction of explosions caused the tunnel to be blown open. The Banshee and Phantom flew outside to the ocean. Buck quickly ditched his Banshee and jumped into the grav lift, bringing him inside the Phantom.

"keep her steady, Mickey! You okay?" Buck asked Romeo.

"just glad we didn't go with your first plan. Just look at those damn tunnels! Ones that aren't flooded are probably.. Packed with buggers. Hell, I wouldn't go down there even if you ordered me to." he sighed. That triggered something in Buck's memory.

"Mickey, turn us around! Find a safe place to land!" Buck yelled.

"what? Why, are you crazy?" Mickey yelled.

"I lost something!" Buck yelled back.

"now I know where to find her." he whispered to himself.

October 20, 2552

Data Center, New Mombassa, East Africa, Earth

"clear?" the Rookie asked.

"all clear." Ramirez responded. The two had met up with each other during the night after the failed drop to the Covenant carrier. After exploring the city, they caught Veronica's distress call and followed it. That led them to the Superintendent Data Hive Center.

"damn it's cold down here." Ramirez sighed.

"let's make some noise." the Rookie replied. Opening the first door, the two charge down the slightly foggy hallway, assault rifle and SMG blazing as they cut down the Grunts they saw. As they ran down the hall,

"do it, Virgil, now!" a lone NMPD officer cried out.

"warning. Construction ahead. Expect delays." the AI rang out.

"I'm gonna die, you hear me?"

"this way, we have it trapped!" a Brute growled. The Brute and the small lance he was commanding soon fell to the two lone troopers.

"thanks, you two. They almost had me. I'm trying to get down to the next level to check on my team, but the stack is locked down tight." the officer said. Almost immediately, Ramirez could spot several holes in the officer's story.

"let me try." the Hispanic soldier said.

"welcome. Access granted." the Superintendent said, opening the stack for Ramirez.

"well, guess you two have the magic touch. Crap, buggers!" the officer yelled, firing his shotgun. After the three dispatched of the Drones,

"what the hell's the matter with you, Virgil, trying to get me killed?"

"warning. Hitchhikers may be escaped convicts." the AI said.

"if his mission is to destroy the Superintendent, I'll do it happily." the Rookie whispered.

"I know, he hasn't been that helpful. Other then unlocking several doors for us on the streets, he always speaks in these riddles that I don't understand." Ramirez replied, reloading his M4A1 assault rifle. The three jumped down and continued to their destination. After fighting through hordes of Covenant, they met at a locked Data Stack.

"you two going down to Level 9? Okay then. I could use some backup." After dropping down,

"what are you two doing down here anyway?"

"can't tell you that." Ramirez quickly snapped.

"I guess everyone's got their own secrets, I suppose." the officer muttered under his breath. After shooting up several Brutes,

"wait here. I got to check up on a…. personal issue." the officer said slowly.

"Crime Scene. Restricted Entry."

"shut up, Virgil, you hear me?"

"Icy Condition. Change Required."

"fucking machine! The whole city's gone to hell, wait here and watch for any hostiles! I'll be back!" the officer stammered, running into what appeared to be a frozen office. Ramirez and the Rookie followed him.

"why are we following him?" Rookie asked.

"I don't like him, something's not right with his story." Ramirez whispered.

"such as?"  
>"if the UNSC wanted to shut down a city-wide AI, why would they send police officers to deal with it, they'd send in the Marines. And he seems way too jittery to me. Stay on your guard." Ramirez whispered.<p>

"what are you two, stupid? I said to wait outside!"

"who's he?" Ramirez asked, pointing at a frozen body.

"this ain't your business. Kinsler gave me real specific instructions: make sure the Doc's dead, and double make sure no one knows about it."

"are you scared of me?" Ramirez asked.

"look pal, you know way to much." the officer said, raising his shotgun. Ramirez was faster, his M4 rifle already up and spitting out rounds into the officer's face.

"nice one." the Rookie sighed.

"let's get going." Ramirez responded. They stepped out into the hallway again and ran down it.

"damn, it's freezing." the Rookie said.

"must've been that argon gas Kinsler used." Ramirez muttered. As they ran down the hall, they caught something on their comm.

"Buck? Who knows if you can hear me, but… I'm sorry. I should've told you more about the mission, more….. about everything."

"let's go." Ramirez said, sprinting down the hall. When they reached the final door, Ramirez pounded on it. The door almost immediately opened up to reveal Veronica pointing her silenced Magnum sidearm at his head.

"Ramirez, I thought you were dead."

"no time for chit-chat, it's freezing out here. Oh, and we got several Drones behind us." he said, walking inside the room.

"alright, stay quiet."

"what's that?" the Rookie asked.

"some idiots blew the building on top of the shaft. Woke up the whole hive. Down there, that's the Superintendent. The AI that runs everything in the city. My mission-no, our mission, is to secure the Super and all the data it's carrying. Problem is, only one way to get down there, straight through the hive. I would've been suicide to go through alone, I was hoping for some backup. Looks like you two are it. Ramirez, you bring your grenades?" Veronica asked.

"sorry, I'm all out. We can still make it through. Joseph and I have been shooting our way through the streets during the past few hours." Ramirez.

"you two must really know your stuff. Show me." Veronica said, cocking her pistol. The three left the room and shot their way past all the Drones that came to kill them.

"this is just the start of the hive, it'll get worse down below. Here, down the hole." Veronica ordered, jumping down a hole.

"damn, looks much bigger up close." Ramirez said, referring to the Superintendent.

"it's getting warmer. We must be getting closer to the hive." Veronica said.

"all the more reason to pick it up." Veronica said, getting on an elevator.

"Elevator Up. Next Stop…"

"Bugger Central." the three humans replied. They found themselves in a very cavernous room with drones on the ceiling.

"keep moving, don't stop." Veronica said. The drones spotted them and gave chase.

"keep shooting, don't let up!" Joseph cried out.

"we can't stop now, keep going!" Veronica yelled, firing her pistol. They quickly got past the cavern and onto the platform holding the AI. The Brutes, however, beat them to it and were attempting to shoot the door open.

"open this door, traitor!" the Brute captain roared.

"Spray and neuter your pets. All dogs must be kept on leash." the AI rang out.

"smoke 'em." Ramirez said, firing his rifle. After the Brutes went down,

"get inside, hurry! Watch your corners and don't stop." Cpt. Dare ordered. Running down the hallway while being scanned, they opened the door on the end and found themselves in a large room with a massive data core in the center. The lights then went out.

"great." Ramirez muttered, flicking the flashlight on his rifle. A lone Engineer came out.

"wait." Dare said, putting her hand on the barrel of Ramirez's rifle.

"we've been seen them on other ops, but every time we get close the SPARTAN's simply shoot them to pieces. The very best we can tell, their slaves or prisoners. Either way, they don't like the Covenant anymore then we do. The slipspace event fried most of the Super's circuits. I thought it might be finishing the job."

Veronica then reached out gently patted the side of the Engineer's head.

"but now I see you weren't trying to hurt the Superintendent. You were trying to fix it. ONI believes their some sort of biological supercomputers. And if I'm right, this one has taken the Super's data and combined it with it's own. All we need to find out about the Covenant, what they're after that's beneath the city, is right in here." Veronica said softly. Joseph seemed interested as well. Ramirez, however, had his attention elsewhere.

"guys, we got brutes." the Ranger said, viewing a security camera. Several Jump Pack Brutes were flying down.

"Dammit. Buggers must've raised the alarm." Veronica sighed. The camera moved and they spotted a single black figure, an ODST. Veronica seemed to recognize the figure.

"Buck!"

"Veronica? Where the hell are you?"  
>"Data Center, but we're coming out."<p>

"we?"  
>"no time to explain, but do not, I repeat, do not shoot anything pink!"<br>"whatever you say, just come on!"

"those Brutes will kill the Engineer first chance they get. You. Stay behind me. Okay?" Veronica asked the alien.

"show time." Joseph asked, reloading his SMG. The door opened and the Brutes started shooting. Ramirez and Joseph quickly killed them all.

"go, trooper! I'll cover the Engineer!" Dare yelled.

"Rookie, Ramirez, I could use a hand over here!" the veteran ODST sergeant yelled. After shooting their way through more Covenant,

"this is our exit, get going!" Buck yelled, running though the door on the right. They came across a large pile of sleeping Drones.

"son of a bitch!" Ramirez cursed beneath his breath.

"keep going, don't wake 'em up. Uh, about this asset. Feel free to fill me in whenever." Buck snarked.

"not now, Buck!" Veronica snapped. After quietly running down the hall, they found their only exit locked.

"did anyone bring any charges?" Ramirez asked.

"doesn't matter, we got a key." Veronica said. As the Engineer was busy unlocking the door,

"I've seen hundreds of these things today, thousands more during the war! Why is this single Engineer so important?" Buck asked.

"this engineer knows what the Covenant are after! If I could safely capture more of them, I would! What they know could win the war!"

"oh." Buck said.

"you haven't killed any of 'em, have you?"  
>"just one. Or, maybe two." he replied sheepishly.<p>

"nice work." Veronica said, rather irritated.

"how the heck was I supposed to know?"

The door opened up and they found more snoozing Drones. Ramirez and Joseph just shoot them all.

"nice work." Buck commented.

"there's the elevator, let's go." Joseph said. After the doors closed,

"Jesus Christ, that thing stinks. Kinda reminds me of when-" Buck started to take off his helmet, but when he did Veronica immediately punched him.

"what was that for?" Buck coughed.

"abandoning the mission."

"what mission? You dropped off the damn grid! My squad was scattered-"

He was cut short when Veronica kissed him.

"and that?" he murmured.

"for coming back."

It was then they realized that had company with them.

"thank you."

"you two did good, no doubt. But we're not outta this yet."

As everyone left the elevator, Dare looked backed and winked at the two soldiers.

"this job just gets harder and harder." Ramirez muttered.

"it always does." Joseph snorted.

October 21, 2552

Waterfront Highway, New Mombassa, East Africa, Earth

"Captain, how 'bout you hang back, let us three clear a path." Buck stated.

"agreed. I'll stay with the asset, give it close cover."

"alright troopers, let's go! Shit, Deployable Tower! Ramirez, take it out!" Buck yelled. While Buck and Joseph gave covering fire, the USA Ranger ran to the watchtower and jumped into the lift. After killing the grunts onboard, he manned one of the plasma turrets and began slaughtering the Brutes and Jackals down below. After they all died,

"Captain, let's move!" Buck yelled.

"where are we going, exactly?" Dare and Joseph asked.

"Waterfront Highway. Fastest route out of the city."

As the small squad ran down a small street,

"can't that thing move any faster?" Ramirez yelled.

"all the shooting has it frightened!"

"want me to give it a little push?" Buck smirked.

"what do you think?" Veronica asked irritated.

"just trying to help."

They soon entered a small building with a cargo elevator. Boarding the lift, they found themselves at Waterfront Highway. With three Covenant cruisers flying over them.

"when did this happen?" Veronica asked, pointing to a cruiser.

"oh them? They started showing up last night before I went underground."

"and you waited until now to tell me that?" Veronica asked angrily. A little pissed off, Buck removed his helmet.

"oh I'm sorry, I was busy making sure perfume over here didn't catch a round and blow us all up!"

"Eddie Buck, always thinking with your gun! You haven't changed one damn bit!"

"me, what about you? Oh, so full of big ONI secrets you can't give a guy a single yes or no answer."

"that's not fair!"

"you got that right!"

"I never thought I'd see you again, dammit!"

"yeah.. Well, here I am."

A Cruiser jumped overhead, interrupting their fight.

"we gotta move. Right now. Or where you to busy to plan our exit?"  
>"I stole a Phantom, yes, thank you very much. I hide it in the shipyards down the highway." Buck smirked. Taking a look at his Warthog,<p>

"but I only have room for two. So, that thing's gonna ride in your lap."

"The Engineer, where did it go?" Veronica asked, realizing that the alien was gone.

"he's inside the Olifant, in case you two were wondering." Ramirez said, riding shotgun in Buck's warthog. To prove his point, a tentacle popped out and rang the horn twice. Dare ran up to the large machine.

"keep me covered. And try to keep up." she smirked.

"take my advice, Rookie. You ever fall for a woman? Make sure she's got a pair." Buck said, putting his helmet back on. The Rookie took the wheel while Buck grabbed the minigun. Ramirez rode shotgun. As the warthog roared down the road, they spotted the Olifant leaning off the main road.

"uh, captain? Pick a lane, would ya?" Ramirez asked.

"it's a little crowded in here. The engineer is doing something with the control circuits. Hey! Watch where you put that." she snapped. The garbage truck simply smashed through the scattered cars on the road.

"well, that's one way to get through this mess." Rookie muttered, slamming on the gas. After shooting their way through Covenant opposition and avoiding scattered vehicles, they found themselves at a locked checkpoint.

"dammit, doors are locked." Buck sighed.

"Covenant must've locked these doors. Give the Engineer a second to override the lock."

After the lock was picked, the doors opened and the two vehicles roared through. Jackals immediately fired on the Olifant. Energy shields suddenly appeared on the truck.

"what's that, shields?" the Rookie asked.

"the Engineer must've found a way to extend it shields, send a current through the outer plating. I don't know how long they'll last, so stay close!"

"you got it, Veronica!" Buck yelled, firing the mini-gun. As they opened another door, another cruiser roared over them.

"where's that cruiser coming from?" Ramirez asked.

"I don't know, but they're all heading toward the slipspace crater, the Covenant dig site north of the city."

"what the hell's down there that's so important?" Buck muttered to himself. After shooting through more Covenant, including two Wraiths, they found an abandoned Gauss 'Hog.

"wait, Gauss 'Hog! Let's change vehicles!" Buck yelled. After taking the superior war machine, they began their romp down the highway. This time, they had turrets, Ghosts, Wraiths, and towers to contend with. As well as two Banshees that noticed them. A Scarab then dropped off on the far end of the highway.

"Buck, Scarab!"

"I see it, must've dropped off from one of those cruisers! Just keep driving, it hasn't spotted us yet!" Buck yelled.

"how the hell did you make it down this highway in one piece?"

"there weren't as many Covenant last night."

A Fuel Rod cannon then exploded next to the Warthog. Ramirez was sent forward in the seat and slammed into the comm.

"…..SC forces be advised. We are retaking New Mombassa. I repeat, all UNSC forces, be advised, we are retaking New Mombassa. General Shepherd has organized a 34,000 strong army of UNSC Marines and Army Troopers to retake New Mombassa. All forces head to the rally point at Sector Bravo-Alpha, five, five, Omega-Three." that was rather good news.

"Veronica, did you hear that, General Shepherd's gonna retake New Mombassa!" Buck yelled. Two UNSC Marathon-class cruisers and two UNSC frigates flew overhead, firing their MAC cannons with dozens of Longswords swarming over them, missiles screaming through the sky.

"damn bastard, I thought he was dead. Looks like we know what he was doing all along." Veronica said in disbelief. After unlocking another door,

"Scorpion tanks, let's grab 'em!" Ramirez yelled, ditching the Warthog. There were two Scorpion tanks lying around. Buck and the Rookie took one with Buck manning the machine gun, while Ramirez took the other one and manned it by himself. The doors opened up to reveal Shade turrets, two AA wraiths and a lot of Ghosts. After blasting them to pieces,

"let's get to that rally point!" Veronica ordered.

A Covenant assault carrier then appeared out of the skies as the three UNSC vehicles rolled down the highway.

"assault carrier, ten O'clock high! Look at the size of that thing!" Buck said in awe. After driving through the next set of gates, they spotted something bad.

"looks like it's charging it's energy cannon." Rookie said.

"but the dig site's on the far end of the city." Buck said confused. After driving through more gates, they found the Carrier glassing the city in the distance.

"damn it, no! they're gonna glass the city and then burn the whole planet! Damn aliens, it's just like Reach all over again!" Buck yelled angrily.

"we got outta there, we'll get outta here. Just remain calm." Veronica reassured him.

"right. Okay. Mickey, you read me? Change of plans, you're coming to us."

"uh, skies are kinda crowded, Gunny." Mickey replied. He and everyone else in the Phantom hadn't received the message of Gen. Shepherd's counterattack.

"no other choice, Covenant just wasted the highway. We'll keep rolling as far as we can. Get in the air and get your asses over here." Ramirez muttered, firing his Scorpion.

"alright, we'll pick you up."

"and whatever you do, stay clear of that carrier." Buck said, not mentioning Shepherd's counterattack. He just assumed that Mickey heard of it. A Scarab then appeared.

"Scarab, look out! This one's onto us!" Buck yelled. The two tanks fired their guns, but the Scarab was faster and disabled the Olifant.

"Veronica! Damn you, Veronica! Talk to me!" Buck yelled frantically.

"the Asset's secure." she coughed.

"fuck the alien, what about you?"

"I'm fine, but this garbage truck's had it."

"everyone, take the off ramp! I see a building, north side of the highway! We'll hole up there and wait for the evac."

After leaving the tanks, Buck, Rookie and Ramirez quickly secured the building by killing the two sleeping grunts guarding it.

"Mickey, what's your ETA?"  
>"had to reroute, Gunny, the whole damn city's on fire."<br>"Trooper, I have a Tier One Asset and a whole bunch of Covenant who want it dead. Whatever you have to do, step on it!"

"yes ma'am!"

After stocking up on Ammo and weapons,

"enemy Phantom, 12 o'clock, right in front of us! Okay, here they come!" Buck yelled. Waves of waves of Covenant soldiers began storming the makeshift fortress. They kept on coming, and the four soldiers kept holding them off. After about two hours of constant fighting, two Wraiths appeared on the highway and began launching mortars.

"Wraiths on the highway!" Dare yelled.

"that's not good!" Ramirez yelled, shooting up a grunt.

"where the hell's our evac?" Joseph yelled, firing a rocket launcher at a Brute Captain. Mickey's Phantom then appeared, plasma cannons firing at the Wraiths.

"yee-haw! Light 'em up, boys!" he cried happily.

"Romeo, take the one the left. I got the one on the right." Dunn yelled.

"I got it, keep her steady." the wounded sniper sighed. After the Wraith's were destroyed, the captured Phantom hovered over the parking lot.

"you ever seen a finer group of soldiers?" Buck asked, very proud of his team.

"other than the SPARTAN's, probably not." Veronica said, feeling the same amount of pride. Sgt. Foley then came down, pointing his SCAR-H rifle at the alien.

"that thing safe?"  
>"long as it doesn't get shot."<p>

A Covenant assault carrier then jumped out right over them.

"let's get the hell outta here!" Foley yelled. The Engineer refused to move.

"this is why I shoot first, and ask questions later." Foley muttered, shoving the alien into the grav lift, bringing it and Dare into the Phantom.

"what can I say? It was a helluva night." Buck sighed. He, the Rookie, Foley and Ramirez stepped into the lift. After securing their passengers, the Phantom flew away just as the carrier began glassing New Mombassa. Inside the dropship,

"Easy does it." Buck sighed, gently putting Romeo on the ground.

"uh, we went through hell for that?" he sighed, pointing at Dare and the Engineer.

"give him some meds, would ya?" he muttered to Ramirez.

"it's important. It knows things, things that could help us win the war."

"shoot gunny. I wasn't talking about the alien." Romeo sighed. Resisting the urge to give Romeo another battle wound,

"Mickey, I'm sending you a very special co-pilot."  
>"what? I don't want one of those things in here!"<p>

"it won't bite. And unlike you, I knows what to say to keep those cruisers off our tail!"

"I don't think they care. Looks like they found what they're looking for." Veronica said, staring out the side of the ship.

"and what about us?" Buck asked.

"win this war… and ask me that again." Veronica said, taking Buck's hand. The side doors closed and the Phantom flew away.

"Mickey, I got new orders for you."

"yeah, what is it?"  
>"take us to Sector Bravo-Alpha, five, five, Omega-Three. General Shepherd's organizing a task force to retake New Mombassa." Buck ordered.<p>

"Shepherd's alive?" Dutch asked.

"has 34,000 soldiers under his command, gonna retake the city." Ramirez sighed.

"I wanna hear that." Mickey said, a little excited. He turned on the comm and put it on the speaker.

"all UNSC Forces, this is General Shepherd. The counterattack has failed. I say again, the counterattack has failed. We are abandoning New Mombassa, I repeat, we are abandoning New Mombassa. We also have orders to tactically nuke the city. All units pull out now, we are nuking the city. If your still inside when the bombs fall, your service will be honored. Shepherd out." that was not good news at all.

"MICKEY, GET US OUTTA HERE, RIGHT NOW!"

"did you guys hear that?"  
>"THAT'S WHY WE GOTTA GO, NOW STEP ON IT!" Buck screamed.<p>

"General Shepherd, this is Major Bishop of the 45th Longsword Bombardier's. We have the FENRIS warheads, 2 minutes to weapons release."

"copy that, Major, release of nuclear weapons is authorized. Flatten that city." Shepherd said.

"roger that, General."

Mickey gave the Phantom all it had.

"1 minute, 30 seconds to weapons release." Major Bishop said over the radio.

"how many warheads do you think they have?" Dutch asked.

"don't know, don't care. Mickey, get us outta here!"

"what do you think I'm doing?" the pilot snapped.

"30 seconds to weapons release."

"are we clear of the blast radius?"

"if it's one bomb, then yes. But we don't know how many they have, so-"  
>"weapons release now." Bishop said. The Longswords flew over New Mombassa and released their warheads. Several bright lights and several large mushroom clouds appeared, leveling the city and destroying anything the blast radius touched. While anyone and anything on the ground was certainly vaporized, the Covenant starships over the dig site were very high in the sky, safely away from the deadly weapons. If Shepherd's plan to nuke the city was to destroy the Covenant starships, he failed. Other than that, he successfully wiped New Mombassa off the face of the Earth in as little as two minutes. The captured Phantom barely escaped the destruction. The Longswords then pulled up beside the Phantom.<p>

"General, I got a rogue Phantom trying to high-tail it outta here, requesting permission to kill it."  
>"negative. Bring it down here so we can interrogate the prisoners. Shepherd out."<p>

Mickey immediately complied with the order. They followed the Longswords to a massive military base at the Mt. Kilimanjaro National Park. Two massive Marathon cruisers were hovering over the base.

"how many do you think are down there?" Buck asked.

"I don't know." Veronica sighed. When the Phantom landed, they were immediately greeted by Gauss 'Hogs, Scorpion tanks and UNSC Marines. When the doors opened. They were surprised to find several ODST's with a large alien creature.

"report this to General Shepherd immediately, he's gonna wanna see this." a UNSC Marine Captain ordered. A Warthog soon pulled up. Shepherd climbed out. His uniform was a little burned and he had large bandage on the side of his head.

"Captain Dare."

"General Shepherd."

The two saluted.

"what's that?" Shepherd asked, pointing to the Engineer with his cigar.

"what we were looking for. Our mission was to go beneath the city and secure this asset. This Engineer holds everything the Covenant has, why they're here at Earth, what they're digging up, everything." Veronica smiled.

"when'd you get it?"  
>"we got it last night." she said a little proudly.<br>"you did, just your whole squad, grabbed it last night?" Shepherd asked.

"yes sir, we did." she said proudly.

"DO YOU MEAN TO TELL ME I LOST 34,000 MEN AND WOMEN, TRYING TO GRAB THAT THING WHEN YOU HAD IT THE WHOLE TIME?" Shepherd yelled angrily. Veronica and her squad were stunned. She stammered, trying to find an answer.

"I thought you were retaking the city." Mickey said.

"what are you, stupid or something? I wasn't gonna retake New Mombassa, I don't have the manpower to do that! I was gonna grab that asset and bring it back here because I thought you guys were dead! The only reason I ordered that strike was because if I couldn't' grab it, at least I wouldn't let the Covenant keep their hands on it!" Shepherd yelled. The squad was stunned silent; they had no idea that Shepherd lost 34,000 men, all just to grab one vital asset.

"all those men and women I lost, their blood is all on your hands, Captain Dare. Try and live with that." Shepherd growled. He then left, shaking his head. He hopped on top of his Warthog and faced his men.

"alright people, pack it all up! We're leaving Africa, there's plenty of Covenant on other parts of Earth we can save! Not you, Captain! You're taking your squad and the alien up to the Cairo. Admiral Hood wants to debrief you personally." Shepherd ordered. As Shepherd's men began taking the base apart and putting all the soldiers and equipment into the massive cruisers, Captain Dare and her team boarded a Pelican, which took off toward the Cairo. During the flight,

"I just wish I'd known about Shepherd's plan. I coulda told him to leave the city, that we already had the asset." Dare said.

"that doesn't matter, Veronica. We got the alien, that's all that matters." Edward said, trying to reassure her.

"wonder the SPARTAN's are doing." Mickey said.

* * *

><p><strong>Please Read and Review. Also, if my description of nuking New Mombasa seems unrealistic, please PM me so I can write a more realistic description. I'm not very good at describing how nuclear weapons work, so I just kinda winged it.<strong>


	9. Chapter 8

**I don't own anything. You all know what I own, it's in the disclaimers in the previous chapters. Sorry about taking long to upload this one, writer's block is the worst.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 8<p>

November 2, 2552.

Unknown Alien Construct [Installation 05]

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

UNSC In Amber Clad

The Covenant carrier Solemn Penance flew out of the Slipspace rupture, followed by the Rise of the Morning Sun, the In Amber Clad, and lots of debris from New Mombassa. In the Morning Sun,

"gimme a damage report." Keyes sighed, lurching forward in his command chair.

"engine cores are cold, we're drifting. The main reactor and slipspace engine is still working, though. We'll have to warm up the system again." Brown said.

"the MAC systems are still online, but the Archer pods are cold. So we'll have to rekey the system. The Yamato guns are cold, and our laser turrets and plasma turrets are dead. We'll need to reboot the entire defense grid." Richtofen stated.

"do it, and find out where the hell we are. Brown, Richtofen, since you two know how to operate this ship, you two are banned from participating in any ground operations. I need you two, probably now more than ever." Keyes groaned, rubbing his neck. Down in the pod room,

"sorry for the jump, Major MacTavish. You alright?"

In the pod, the Scottish major was smoking a slightly bent cigar.

"I'm good. Task Force 141, sound off!"

"we're fine!" everyone replied. Up in the bridge,

"sir, we're coming up on something." Ensign Lovell reported.

"what is it? Cortana… what the fuck is that?" Keyes slowly asked as they came in view of the alien object. Cortana knew too well what it was.

"that, captain, is another Halo ring." she said rather nonchalantly.

"say what?" MacTavish coughed on his Cuban cigar.

"you said they were super weapons, correct?"  
>"that's right. If activated, these rings will cause destruction on a galactic scale."<p>

"define galactic scale."

"they destroy all life in the galaxy."

The bridge was dead silent when she said that.

"I want… I want all the data you gathered from the first Halo Ring. Anything and everything. I don't care if I have the pay grade or not."

"yes sir."

"contact my daughter and tell her to dock her ship in the main hanger bay. She's to transfer all her equipment and personal over to the Morning Sun. Can we rig the _In Amber Clad_ so we can control it from the bridge? Weapons, navigation, everything?"  
>"yes we can. Why?" Cortana narrowed her eyes.<p>

"I'm gonna keep the ship hidden, but we'll use the frigate as a decoy ship. I don't know how long that'll work, but the longer we keep ourselves hidden, the better."

"is this because of the Flood, you don't wanna risk another attack?" Brown said a little loudly.

"get to work. Where's our target?"  
>"the enemy ship stopped beneath the ring, sir. We'll be passing over it pretty soon." Lt. Dominique sighed.<p>

"alright. Given what we know about this ring, it's more important that we capture Regret, find out why he attacked Earth, and why he came here. Master Chief, take the SPARTAN's and First Platoon. It's gonna be a hard drop, so secure the landing zone once you get down there. Major MacTavish, with General Shepherd back on Earth, you're in charge of all our Marines. Take 3 platoons in the Pelicans and follow them in."

"yes sir." Soap replied, climbing out of his HEV.

"until I can actually move and fight, I'm gonna stay hidden. And in case you're wondering, the ship took quite a beating. And they haven't caught us yet, so I'm gonna take the time to gather as much intel about this ring as I can. Master Chief, once you and your men are on the ground, you're on your own."

"I understand." John said, stubbing out the remains of his cigarette. As the warship gently glided over the Halo ring, several HEV pods shot out and screamed toward the alien ring world.

"mind the bump." Cortana warned as the parachute deployed. Deciding that the journey was taking too long,

"I'm bailing out, I'm dying of boredom here." John said, blasting the hatch off his pod and jumping right out.

"are you crazy or simply insane?" Cortana cried out.

"a little of both." John smirked as he modified the shields on his armor to create what appeared to be large wings, allowing him to glide down. Hefting his rocket launcher, he took aim and fired, blowing up a Shade turret.

"could we possibly make any more noise?" Cortana asked. The rest of the pods then landed; gunfire and plasma weaponry reverberated throughout the valley.

"I guess so." she answered her own question. John activated his jetpacks and flew down toward the landing zone. Firing the last rocket, he ditched the now-useless weapon and pulled out his rifle.

"nice job, jumping outta the pod!" Carter sarcastically yelled, sniping a grunt with his DMR.

"I was getting bored, the trip took too long." John replied.

"hey, I woulda done the same thing." Emile said, rushing forward with his shotgun.

"yeah right, you pissed your pants when you jumped outta the Cairo with me. Don't deny it." John said. Emile was silent when he said that.

"come on, we got Covenant to kill." Jorge said, walking slowly as he fired his chain-gun. After they dispatched of all the Covenant forces,

"okay, I want the ODST's to take control of the shade turrets." John ordered. He then looked at the one he destroyed.

"well, the ones that aren't destroyed." he simply shrugged his shoulders.

"Chief, we got another Phantom on approach." Jun said.

"alright, everyone hunker down. We don't know how many soldiers they'll bring, so let's assume they're bringing a lot." John said, taking a position in a higher level on the Forerunner ruins. The Phantom arrived and dropped off several Spec Op Elites.

"smoke 'em." John ordered. The elites soon fell under vicious gunfire. Soap's Pelican's soon arrived.

"special delivery: Task Force 141!" he yelled cockily over the radio.

"don't get cocky, you'll get killed." John sighed. Several Warthogs were dropped.

"we spotted a large building in the middle of the lake." MacTavish said.

"I saw it too, looks like a giant temple. If were a megalomaniac-_and I'm not_-that's where I'd hole up." Cortana said.

"alright then. John, take the 141 and kill Regret. Bring his head back on a platter if you have to."

"with pleasure." John said, reloading his rifle.

"oh, one more thing. You guys got yourselves a whole army between here and the temple." MacTavish said.

Heavy metal music then started blasting on the radio. It was an old metal band called _In Flames_.

"let's see what they think of this. LET'S ROCK IT!" he yelled, taking the turret in the lead warthog with a rocket launcher on his back, his Commando grenadier rifle hanging on his shoulder. Woods definitely had a good taste in music; everyone thought that if he wasn't a soldier, he'd make a good rock n' roll artist. The Warthogs roared through the pathway, killing any Covenant they saw. When they saw the lake,

"wow, it's like a postcard. Dear major, kicking ass in outer space, wish you were here." Dempsey said.

"I heard that, you jackass!" MacTavish growled.

"pfft. Army my ass, there's no army here." Mason smirked. Dozens of Phantoms suddenly decloaked and offloaded all their troops and equipment. The small convoy was surrounded.

"no army. You had to open your mouth, didn't you?" Weaver growled. The Covenant then charged them.

"Marines, hold your position!" Woods yelled, slamming the bolt back on the M41 chain gun.

"let 'em have it!" Makarov yelled, firing his M203 launcher. The Covenant were met with a blistering wave of gunfire and grenades.

"Woods, you got some Elites behind you!" Emile yelled.

"yeah, okay then!" Woods yelled, not caring about the threat. He then quickly jerked the gun around and shredded the aliens.

"come on!" he yelled, purposely urging the Covenant to attack.

"John, get in that building and get the bridge open, we can't stay here!" Carter yelled.

"what do you think I'm trying to do?" he hollered back. He was currently in CQB with two Elite's. the elite on his right was soon shredded with gunfire from Wood's chain-gun. The elite on his left drew out an energy sword to finish the job. John lurched forward, grabbed the alien's arm and snapped it in half, about 90% the wrong direction at the elbow. Using all his strength, he swung his right arm at the alien's head and crushed it, killing the Elite instantly. Picking up the Energy Sword, he turned it on and flung it at an Elite General who was apparently leading the attack. The sword pierced his chest and heart, killing him instantly.

"hey, where's the Arbiter?" Dempsey asked.

"don't know, don't care, just keep shooting!" Reznov yelled.

"does anyone know where Richtofen and Brown are?" Johnson asked, reloading his MA5C.

"scuttlebutt has it that they're still onboard the ship." Bowman said.

"I guess those pussies don't like plasma and lead." Dempsey scoffed. That was actually the reverse for those two; Professor Emmett Brown and Dr. Edward Richtofen were among the most shot-up individuals in the entire Task Force.

"alright, let's get that bridge open." Roebuck sighed. John-117, Roebuck, Miller and Polonsky ran into the building where the controls were. They also saw a large hologram of Regret.

"who's that?" Polonsky asked.

"our target, Polonsky. I just wanna know what he's doing. Cortana?" Roebuck asked.

"hold on a second, sergeant. It appears he's giving some sort of a sermon. I've been listening to it since we've first landed. So far, some standard Covenant literature, but I'll translate if he says anything interesting."

The hologram then began speaking English.

"the Forerunners, our most exalted lords, used the seven sacred rings to flee a doomed existence, to escape their endless struggle against the Flood. Long ago, the Prophets and Elites fought an equally fruitless war. Indeed, I suspect we would still be at each other's throats had the Prophets not found evidence of the Forerunners and their Great Journey."

"hmm. Alright, let's find the bastard and kill him." Roebuck said.

"not yet. We got those guys to contend with." John said, pointing to 5 Wraiths on the other side of the bridge.

"does anyone have any rocket launchers?" Carter asked.

Woods hefted his launcher and blew two tanks away. Unfortunately, he didn't bring any extra ammo.

"uh, MacTavish, we could use some tanks right about now." Woods asked.

"right, I'll see what I can bring. Hold out for a bit." the Scottish major replied. The Wraiths continued to pound the human task force. Two Pelicans arrived and dropped of two Scorpion tanks.

"bout fucking time." Richard muttered, hopping in a tank and blasting a Wraith to pieces. The remaining two Wraiths were quickly destroyed.

"alright, everyone hop on. We're pushing forward." John ordered, taking the lead tank. The two tanks roared across the bridge, pushed past the wreckages and continued through the ruins, killing any Covenant they saw. After shooting through a maze of ruins and splattering the walls with the blood of fallen soldiers,

"Master Chief, this is Pelican 481, I'm coming in to drop more Marines and ammunition. Be advised, I'm kinda stretching myself thin here; I'm dropping off armor and troops all over this damn ring. I won't be available forever, but if you need me, just gimme a call." 'Nikolai' Ramius called.

"roger that, Ramius." John replied. The Pelican dropped off several Marines and ammunition pods, then left.

"alright people, ditch the tanks. We're on foot from here on out." John ordered.

"the Covenant are holed up in the center of this structure. Let's clear 'em out!" Cortana suggested. The 55+ strong group of soldiers ran through the ancient ruins, killing any Covenant they saw.

"let's keep moving. Find that bastard prophet and kill him." John ordered. Everyone quickly stepped up the pace. As they ran through the building, they came across another hologram of Regret.

"another one, what's he blabbering on about now?" Emile asked.

"in a gesture of peace and reconciliation, the Prophets promised to find the means of the Forerunners' transcendence, and to share this knowledge with the Elites. The Elites promised to defend the Prophets as they searched. A simple arrangement, that has become our binding Covenant!"

"transcendence? More like mass suicide." Cortana whispered to John. Only she, John and the Arbiter knew what the rings could really do, everyone else didn't. Running out of the building, they found themselves over looking a large valley with a waterfall.

"you always bring me to such nice places." Cortana joked.

"you know you like where I go. Okay Task Force, shred it up!" John ordered. The forest was soon riddled with horrendous gunfire, along with all the Jackals and few Elites that were hiding among the wildlife.

"so, where now?" Price asked, reloading his M4A1.

"there. That narrow gap in the wall on the far side. Our target's gonna be on the other side of that." John pointed. They found themselves looking at the lake, in a rather large structure. The first of three.

"hey Cortana, any word on the Morning Son or the In Amber Clad?" Lev asked, reloading his M240 HMG.

"not yet. I'm actually surprised the Covenant hasn't found them yet."

"haven't found 'em yet, don't they know we've already made landfall?" Anatoly asked, sniping an Elite minor.

"they Covenant did know we made landfall, but they don't consider us to be a threat."

"they're in for a nasty surprise." Kat smirked, tossing a frag. After clearing the structure of all Covenant, they began to leave when they spotted another hologram of Regret. John chose to ignore it, but Cortana stopped him.

"wait, go back." Cortana said. John put the data-chip in the holo-projector and Cortana's naked form appeared.

"yup, that's what I thought he said. Looks like Regret's gonna activate Halo."

"are you sure?" John asked. Cortana snapped her fingers and the hologram of Regret began speaking English.

"I shall light this holy ring, release it's cleansing flame, and burn a path into the divine beyond!"

"pretty much." she smirked.

"oh boy. Captain, we got a problem." John called the ship.

"I overheard it. But from what I understand, the Prophet is gonna need object, something called the Index, to activate the ring. I've already located a structure called 'The Library'. If it works like the similar structure on the other Halo ring we found, the Index will probably be in there."

"I'm betting the Covenant are thinking the exact same thing." MacTavish said, smoking his cigar.

"Major, extract your men and meet me at the Library. Take the Marines from the 141 as well, the SPARTAN's can handle Regret. Miranda, I'm going down to the planet surface. I'm giving you command of the ship until I return. Master Chief, find that prophet and kill him; he's given us all the intel we need." Keyes said, cutting the link. Back on the ring, Drones began swarming them.

"I FUCKING HATE DRONES!" Dempsey screamed.

"either I'm drunk or I'm seeing giant flying bugs with laser guns…" Nikolai slurred as he fired his SMG and drank some vodka simultaneously.

"everyone outside, right now!" Roebuck yelled. They found more Covenant.

"no big surprise here." Hudson sighed, firing his rifle.

"just keep shooting. They'll give up eventually." Mason said.

"what makes you think that, they have more soldiers and more ships than we do." McNamara said, racking his shotgun.

"hmm. Good point." Mason replied.

"cut the chit-chat, keep shooting!" John ordered. A Phantom arrived and dropped off two Hunters. They were quickly dealt with.

"Cortana, the Covenant are getting rather nosey. I don't want to give away my position just yet, so I'm rerouting a few stragglers back to you. I'm sorry, but these pelicans are all the support I can give you." Miranda said.

"understood ma'am. A gondola is launching from the far towers. Big surprise, it's full of Covenant." Cortana sighed.

"five more years until retirement, five more years until retirement." the 141 muttered. It was clear they were already on the edge, they were very close to snapping, especially the SPARTAN-III's. Several Pelicans arrived and dropped off extra ammo.

"Captain Keyes wants to reorganize the soldiers; I got orders to take the marines away! SPARTAN's, you guys are on your own to kill Regret!" MacTavish yelled from his command Pelican. As the Pelicans loaded up on the Marines,

"Master Chief, this is Nikolai. This is my last run for now, but if you need any help, just gimme a call." the Russian pilot said.

"thanks for the tip." John snarked. The Pelicans left, leaving only the SPARTAN's.

"I'm glad they're gone, we can get this done a lot faster." Jorge said, reloading his M247 HMG.

"hey Carter, you and the III's shoot up this morning?" John asked.

"shit, I forgot." Carter gritted his teeth.

"great." John sighed. It was standard for Carter, Kat, Jun, Emile, and Richard to 'shoot up' on the drugs they needed to control their aggressiveness before every mission. If they didn't do that, it was more then likely they would become a liability then a help, especially in the field. But they couldn't do anything about that now.

"alright, use your jetpacks, we'll fly there." John said. The SPARTAN's modified their shields to look more like giant wings. They then activated their built-in jetpacks and flew through the sky. As they flew overhead the bewildered Covenant troops,

"I've intercepted a secure transmission from Regret's carrier to High Charity, that giant city-ship I told everyone about back in 2527. It seems to be a formal apology to the Prophets Truth and Mercy. Apparently, Regret jumped the gun when he attacked Earth. He's asking the other Prophets to 'forgive his premature arrival', arguing that 'no human presence was foretold.' "

"well, that explains why there were so few ships in his fleet when he attacked." Kat remarked.

"but why would a leader such as the prophets have such horrible intel about their enemy's home world?" Richard asked.

"the Cole Protocol. That's probably the reason why; wipe out all the databases and destroy any captured ships. Without our databases, they wouldn't be able to locate our home-world. It does make you wonder how they were able to find most of our colonies, though." John said.

"I've just intercepted another transmission; Regret's carrier just received a response from High Charity. A very well encrypted message from the Prophet of Truth. Listen to this: 'your haste has jeopardized the fulfillment of our Covenant, threatened our grand design. That you shall be spared a public display of our contempt is thanks only to Mercy and his wise counsel.' Truth, Mercy, Regret. Three Prophet Hierarchs. Killing Regret should shake up the Covenant leadership. But frankly, it sounds like you might be doing Truth a favor." Cortana said.

"so why don't we find all three Prophets and kill 'em?" Jorge asked.

"easier said than done. Everyone, check your fuel levels, mine's getting rather low." John said.

"same here, I'm getting close to empty." Kat said.

"I'm practically running on fumes, here." Emile said.

"alright. Everyone, put down on that Gondola, we'll take that to get to the Temple." John ordered. After clearing the Gondola of all Covenant soldiers, they flipped the switch. Seeing as the Gondola wasn't the fastest of all machines, they hunkered down and prepared for any Covenant to attack. As the machine took the SPARTAN's across the lake, they continuously repelled any attacks the Covenant performed. John, Cortana, and Jorge noticed that the Three's were becoming increasingly agitated and very violently, even by SPARTAN's standards.

"Carter, you and the rest of the III's just tell us if you guys are feeling very violent, okay?" John asked. Carter grabbed a jet pack Elite and, with an angry growl, slammed the alien into the wall, crushing his head and ripping his body in half. He then pulled out his knife and proceeded to slice up two more Elites.

"yeah, I don't think they're listening." Jorge said, watching his fellow SPARTAN's slaughter the Covenant with their bare hands.

"how's it going, SPARTAN's?" Captain Keyes asked.

"uh, the Three's are getting very violent. But other than that, we're good."

"roger that. I'm getting as close to the Library as I can, but there's some sort of barrier. We're trying to get past it, I'll keep you posted."

When the gondola arrived at the temple, John noticed the Three's were very jumpy.

"come on, what are waiting for, I wanna get me some of Regret's ass." Emile said, slightly bouncing on his feet.

"we might wanna reconsider that." John said, pointing to the sky. Far above them, hundreds of not thousands of Covenant battle cruisers and assault carriers appeared from multiple slipspace ruptures, followed by High Charity.

"that damn thing looks much bigger in real life." Kat said, staring at High Charity.

"I bet she said that about something else belonging to our commander." Jun whispered to Richard, referring to Carter and Kat's sex lives.

"cut the chit-chat, we got work to do!" John ordered. The SPARTAN's ignored the enemy fleet and ran inside the temple. They quickly found Regret and began to slaughter his Honor Guards.

"there's Regret, kill the motherfucker!" Carter yelled. Emile charged forward, his kukri unsheathed but a Fuel Rod cannon burst from the Prophet's throne sent him flying backwards. John quickly snuck up behind the Prophet, jumped on his throne and began pounding the alien's head, reducing it to blood, pieces of bone and brain matter.

"he's dead. Let's find the other two." Kat sighed, reloading her rifle.

"you might wanna wait on that one, Kat. I'm reading dozens of Phantoms are turning around, the Fleet's gonna fire on us!" Cortana said.

"let's get outta here!" John ordered. The SPARTAN's ran out of the temple and saw a Covenant warship charging it's Energy Projector. Without another word, they quickly ran away.

"where are running to?" Jorge yelled.

"anywhere but here! FUCK!" John yelled as he jumped off the ledge into the lake below. The SPARTAN's followed him. As the temple exploded, the SPARTAN's lapsed into unconsciousness. The last thought John had before he blacked out was, _shit, I just remembered what's down here. Cortana's never gonna forgive me for this. And neither will I_…

November 3, 2552

Unidentified Barrier [Sentinel Wall], Unidentified Alien Construct [Installation 05]

45th Armored Battalion

4th Platoon, 3rd Squad

8th Platoon, 1st Squad

Task Force 141

The rumble of Scorpion tanks and Warthogs reverberated throughout the snow-filled valley. Captain Keyes had Major MacTavish gather what forces he could to form a task force to break through the wall and break through to the Library to retrieve the Index. It was imperative they get there before the Covenant. They started early this morning, but now it was very dark. Everyone soldier and vehicle had their night vision on, but even with that they had a bit of a trouble determining the difference between Covenant and Forerunner structure.

"anything, Major?" Captain Keyes asked. His Naval command uniform was replaced with a Marine BDU, an MA5C assault rifle in his hands.

"nothing yet, captain. Sir, I'm receiving reports across the column that, there's something out there. We don't know if it's Covenant or not, but everyone's saying that we shoot first and ask questions later." MacTavish said.

"alright. Give the order, we're going in guns a blazing. But I want them to be selective, I don't want any friendly fire on our part."

"roger that. All tanks, this is MacTavish, fire at will. You have authorization to shoot at whatever you see."

Immediately, the Scorpion tanks opened fire. Despite the HE's causing multiple fireballs when they hit, they still couldn't see anything.

"I can't see a damn thing out there. What the hell is that, is that a phantom?" a tank gunner asked.

"Rhino 2-2, this is Rhino 2-1. Cut the chatter."

"Rhino 2-1, there's something flying out. Damn, what we need is illumination. Someone contact Captain Keyes."

"this is Captain Keyes. Gimme illumination on co-ordinates 55 Echo by 33 Alpha. Fire for effect."

"copy your last, captain. We got lights in the air."

The valley was soon light with bright light. Alien machines flying through the air were attacking what appeared to be mutated Covenant ground vehicles. There were also Covenant troops with horrible mutations on their bodies.

"what the hell are those things?" Johnson yelled.

"all units, open fire! Bring the bastards down!" MacTavish ordered. 90mm HE shells flew towards their targets, burning through the Covenant war machines and Flood matter alike. The Warthogs joined the tanks on the ridge, sending 7.62 rounds toward their victims.

"to any friendly units in the sky, I need a napalm strike on…. Fire for effect, over!" Keyes ordered.

"repeat your last, captain."

"look, just hit everything west of our position with everything you got!"

"captain, we're on bingo fuel already, we can't help you." the pilot replied.

"dammit. Wait a minute, did we bring anything to control the In Amber Clad?" Keyes suddenly asked.

"yeah. Why?"  
>"bring it down, use the ship's cannons to wipe out this Flood." Keyes ordered. The UNSC In Amber Clad then flew overhead, her guns roaring as they sent massive 50mm shells down to the ground, tearing the Flood to pieces.<p>

"alright, let's keep pressing. We don't know what the hell those things were, but everyone needs to stay on your guard. Do not let yourself get caught with your pants down." Keyes ordered. The convoy continued through the burning valley. They spotted only intermittent Covenant vehicles and soldiers, but they were quickly dispatched.

"all units, keep pressing. Son of a bitch, we got enemy tangos all around us! Fire at will, I say again, fire at will!" Captain Keyes yelled, firing his MA5C. Flood began charging them in hordes.

"just like shooting zombies. Except Zombies don't use guns." Nikolai said, firing his SMG. The flood quickly fell, but more kept on coming. Forerunner Sentinels arrived to help, but there were too few.

"we're stuck here! The convoy needs to keep moving! We gotta get to that Library before the Covenant do!" Keyes yelled. The convoy kept on moving and shooting. The tanks were in the front, carving a path through the hordes of Flood that threatened to consume them. Whenever the Flood appeared, they just used the Frigate to hold them off.

"keep moving. We don't stop for nothing." MacTavish growled.

"Col. Robinson, this is Captain Keyes. Head back to the Morning Sun, we have everything under control here."

"roger that, Captain Keyes. Good luck."

The armored convoy continued driving through the snow, killing any Flood and Covenant they saw.

"there's the Library. Now how to get in-Phantom! Shoot him down!" MacTavish yelled. The Scorpions and the In Amber Clad immediately open fired on the lone dropship. The Phantom quickly left before it got shot down.

"alright. Johnson, grab a Platoon of Marines and follow me. Nikolai, get a flight of Pelicans and evac everything and everyone back to the Morning Sun. Let's land the frigate for now." Captain Keyes said. Very soon, the armored column was reduced to two Warthogs and one tank.

"alright, let's find a way inside. There, that door. It should lead somewhere." Keyes said. The three vehicles roared through the opening and found themselves in what appeared to be a large parking garage.

"alright, dismount. Everyone's hostile." Keyes ordered.

"ain't that the truth." McKenzie replied.

"stow it, Marines! Cut the chatter, eyes down range!" Johnson ordered. Quickly and quietly walking through the alien hallways, they found themselves under attack by the Flood.

"open fire, don't stop shooting!" Keyes yelled.

"these fuckers are everywhere!" Perez yelled.

"damn right they're everywhere! These freaks can't be killed!" a marine hysterically yelled.

"keep your head together, leatherneck!" Keyes harshly snarled. After disposing of the Flood,

"alright, let's go. Watch the corners and shadows. If it makes any noise, shoot it. If it makes a noise again, shoot twice to make sure it's dead." Keyes said. After what seemed like forever, they found the Index.

"Johnson, you're with me. The rest of you, hold here. Don't let anything get through these doors." Keyes growled. Johnson and Captain Keyes found themselves in a large room with destroyed Forerunner machines.

"stay sharp, sergeant major." Keyes ordered. Putting the rifle on his back, the captain grabbed a large cable hanging from the roof. Holding back his vomit when he grabbed it, Keyes pushed off the ledge and swung over to the Index. Taking it out of the slot, he put in his belt and swung back.

"got the Index. Now let's get the hell outta here."

"5th Squad, sound off! You hear me, Marines?" Johnson bellowed. Nothing.

"we got trouble." the two unsung their MA5C's and began scanning the room. A cloaked figure quickly moved toward Johnson and knocked the rifle out of his hands. It was a large Elite in very old armor. It was the Arbiter, but Thel' Vadem that served with the Task Force 141; his armor had been heavily modified and they were very visible. Keyes and Johnson suddenly remembered where Thel' Vadem was; onboard the Morning Sun because Captain Keyes gave him explicit orders to stay on the ship. Keyes immediately regretted that decision.

"how ya doing, hinge-head?" Johnson growled. The Arbiter head butted the sergeant, knocking him out cold.

"eat this, slug face!" Captain Keyes yelled, firing his MA5C at the Elite. The alien quickly ducked behind a pillar, but not before his shields were drained. Keyes noticed that his ammo count read two, so he tossed out the clip and slammed in another one.

"Johnson, you still alive?" Keyes yelled. The Arbiter then jumped in front of Captain Keyes and kicked the gun out of his hands. Keyes quickly pulled out his Magnum and fired off one shot before he felt himself being forcibly pulled backwards. He slammed into a large, furry shoulder.

_Damn, I've been captured by the Covenant. Don't come after me, Miranda, just bomb this place until there's nothing left_…. Was all that Captain Keyes thought before he blacked out.

November 3, 2552

Position Unknown

Gravity had very little effect on him. Up was down, down was up. He felt as if he was being constantly rotated up and down. _damn, this feels worse than a hangover_….. John thought as he slowly woke up. He found himself and his fellow SPARTAN's in the clutches of an enemy John hoped he would never see again. He quickly cut the comms off between him, Cortana and the SPARTAN's so it was just him and Cortana. John thought he heard Cortana whimper and shake.

_I'm so sorry, Cortana, for getting us in this mess._ John thought.

"what the fuck is that?" Kat asked.

"I? I am a monument to all your sins." the alien creature rumbled. More tentacles appeared, carrying a struggling Arbiter Thel' Vadamee.

"relax. I'd rather not PISS THIS THING OFF!" Carter hollered. Without the drugs, he and the rest of the III's were getting more and more aggressive. But all their anger could do nothing against the Gravemind, not in their current predicament at least.

"these are machines and nerve, and has their minds concluded. This one is but flesh and faith, and is the more deluded."

"so you're a giant talking weed speaking in rhyme? I really hate my job." Jun growled.

"kill me or release me, parasite. But do not waste my time with talk!" the Arbiter shouted.

"there is much talk. And I have listened. Through rock, and metal, and time. Now I shall talk, and you shall listen."

More tentacles came down, one of them holding a glowing red piece of Forerunner machinery. To John and Cortana, they knew it was another Forerunner monitor. To the rest, they had no idea what it was. In the other tentacles was the Prophet of Regret, or what was left of him.

"Greetings. I am 2401 Penitent Tangent. I am the Monitor of Installation 05." the machine said rather cheerfully.

"and I am the Prophet of Regret, Councilor of the High… Hierarch of the Covenant!" Regret said painfully.

"Reclaimers? Here? At last, we have much to do. This facility must be activated if we are to control this outbreak!" the Monitor said.

"stay where you are! Nothing can be done until my sermon is complete!" Regret groaned in pain.

"not true. This installation has a successful utilization record of 1.2 trillion simulated and one actual. It is ready to fire on demand."

"of all the objects our Lords left behind, there are none so _worthless_ as these Oracles! They know _nothing_ of the Great Journey!" Regret yelled.

"and _you_ know nothing about containment! You have demonstrated a complete disregard to even the most basic protocols!" the Monitor yelled back.

"this one's 'containment'…and this one's 'Great Journey'... are the same." the Gravemind roared. He then lowered his tentacles and the Prophet of Regret began shrieking in fear. The SPARTAN's and the Arbiter could only imagine what was happening to the poor alien.

"your Prophets have promised you freedom from a doomed existence, but you will find no salvation on this ring. Those who built this place knew what they wrought. Do not mistake their intent, or all will perish as they did before." the Gravemind rambled on. The SPARTAN's minus John and Cortana could only imagine what the Gravemind was blabbering on about. The Arbiter stopped struggling for a moment and stared at the creature somewhat curiously.

"this giant talking weed is right. Halo's nothing more than a weapon. Your Prophets are making a big mistake." John said loudly.

"your ignorance already destroyed one of the sacred rings, Demon. It shall not harm another." the Arbiter said determined. The Gravemind had enough. If the Arbiter wouldn't believe the truth, the he'd simply show it to him.

"if you will not hear the truth, then I will show it to you. There is still time to stop the key from turning, but first it must be found. You will search one likely spot," the Gravemind said, motioning to the SPARTAN's.

"and you will search another. Fate had us meet as foes, but this ring will make us...brothers." the Gravemind said, motioning to the Arbiter. Using Halo's teleportation technology, he teleported all the soldiers away from the Gravemind.

November 3, 2552

Covenant Homeworld [High Charity]

"let us in!"

"the parasite's been unleashed, none of us are safe!"

Those were among the few of what the Grunts and Jackals were shouting at the new Brute Honor Guards as they pushed the crowd back. Inside the chamber, Truth was giving a sermon to the Covenant.

"the release of the parasite was unexpected, unfortunate. But, there is no need to panic. In truth, this is a time to rejoice. A moment that all the Covenant should savor. For the Sacred Icon has been found. With it, our path is clear, our entry into the Divine Beyond guaranteed! The Great Journey is nigh and nothing, not even the Flood, can stop it!"

He didn't notice a large group of SPARTAN super-soldiers appearing out of mid-air. The Grunt with the video camera, however, did.

"boo, motherfucker!" Emile yelled, punting the Grunt across the chamber like it was a football.

"kill the Demons!" Truth snarled. The Brute Honor Guards, along with Truth and Mercy quickly left via grav lift, leaving behind several angry Brutes. But they weren't a match for the really aggressive SPARTAN-III's.

"this is the best fucking mission, ever!" Jun yelled, tackling a Brute and snapping it's neck. After killing the Brutes and stealing their weapons,

"the Demons have infiltrated the Council Chamber? Protect the Hierarchs! Seal the exits!" Tartarus bellowed.

"that's not gonna stop us!" Carter growled. More Covenant poured through, but they were quickly killed off. John and Jorge didn't really do anything; they just stood back and let the drug-depraved S-III's kill any Covenant they saw.

"you know, if we kept the Three's away from their drugs, we could just let them fight all our battles." Jorge said.

"that's very tempting, but I'm not gonna risk that. If we did that, they might turn against us. The Marines and ODST's wouldn't stand a chance, and we probably wouldn't as well." John said.

"okay, now that you SPARTAN's are done with your little bloodbath, put me down at the pedestal on the far side, near the door." John did as he was told and Cortana popped up.

"okay, let's review our situation here. Truth has the Index, we gotta kill him or he'll activate the ring. Not a good day in my book." John said.

"what's so bad if he activates the ring, he might actually be doing us a favor if it get's rid of the Flood, I think it's what that creature is called." Carter said.

"okay, time to get your facts straight. Remember those creatures that attacked the Autumn back on the other ring? That's the Flood. That giant creature is called Gravemind and is the central unit of the Flood, the queen if you will, even though it's male. And its bad news if Truth activates the ring."

"why?" Emile asked.

"oh, nothing really. It's just that the Flood feeds on both Human and Covenant, and the ring doesn't really kill the Flood, it's kills their food. So if you activated those rings, you kill off all life in the galaxy. Now, where's Truth?" John asked Cortana.

"WHAT?" the rest of the SPARTAN's collectively yelled out in shock.

"yeah, shit happens." John said in a tone that said only one thing: I don't want to talk about it. The SPARTAN's fought their way through the massive station, killing any Covenant they saw. Which was a lot.

"Truth's moving through the lower levels of the tower. I'll reverse this grav lift; drop down and cut him off." Cortana urged. The SPARTAN's stepped into the lift and took off after the Prophet.

"reinforce all approaches to the holding pens. Slay the demons on sight!" Tartarus bellowed.

"they're beefing up their patrols. Stay sharp." Cortana warned. They burst through a 4-way section. Nothing.

"alright, let's keep moving." Carter ordered.

"wait a minute, I'm getting Marine IFF signatures. They're originating somewhere beneath you. There's a lift in the next room."

"alright, let's find those men and bust 'em out." John ordered. They jumped in the lift and headed down to the first prison level. Immediately, they started killing all the guards.

"I was gonna tell you to do it quietly, but fast and loud works too." Cortana said.

"alright, stock up and ammo and guns. We're gonna need it." John said, grabbing two Plasma Pistols and an Energy Sword. The doors opened up and the Marines poured out, grabbing fallen Covenant weapons.

"listen up, Marines! The SPARTAN's are hunting a prophet, and you're gonna help them kill it!"

"yes ma'am!" the marines responded.

The humans quickly poured out, killing any Covenant they saw.

"Chief, come up to the middle level, there's more prisoners."

The small human task force jumped into the lift and headed to the next level. After killing the guards, they freed the prisoners. After going to the last prison level and freeing the last of the Marines,

"alright, that's the last of them. Get to the lift, now."

As the humans soared upwards,

"fear not, my brothers! The Sacred Icon is now secure. It was Tartarus and his Brutes who took the Icon from the Flood, and for that they have our thanks." Truth said over the speakers.

"excellent. Truth is broadcasting on the move, should make him easier to track."

The SPARTAN's paid no heed to that; they just kept moving through High Charity, killing whatever Covenant they saw. They just killed, and killed, and killed. All the while, Truth was still blabbering on the speakers.

"the Elites have failed to protect the Prophets, and in doing so, have put all our lives at risk. Let no warrior forget his oath, 'Thou, in faith, shall keep us safe, whilst we find the Path.'"

"I've got a fix on Truth just outside this tower, Chief. There's an exit nearby, hurry!"

John absently minded followed Cortana's orders and continued to kill whatever he saw. He was pretty sure that he was mentally scarred for the rest of his life, but he didn't care.

"with my blessing, the Brutes now lead our fleets. They ask for your allegiance, and you shall give it to them."

"I'm getting very tired of what he's saying over the speakers. When are we gonna kill him?" Kat asked.

"soon, Kat, very soon. Well, it'd be sooner if you didn't have all the Marines with you." Cortana said. Immediately, the SPARTAN's turned and gunned down the Marines as if they were Covenant. No remorse, no hesitation, no guilt. Nothing at all.

"I didn't mean for you guys to kill the Marines."

"humanity has lost billions during the war, 15 Marines won't make any difference." John said rather coldly. Now that they had no baggage, they quickly ran through all the opposition. The Covenant warriors were tough, strong and fast, but they were absolutely no match for the SPARTAN super-soldiers, the best warriors the galaxy has ever seen. They left behind a trail of blood and destruction that would've sent the Prophets running away, screaming like little girls.

"newsflash: the Covenant just blew up some of their own ships. Looks like the Great Schism is happening." Cortana said a little grimly.

"seems a little early for that to happen." John replied.

On the speaker,

"creatures of the Covenant: the path is broad, and we shall walk it side by side! Be glad! A reward for all your toil and all your sacrifices is near at hand." Truth blabbered on again. They then saw the _In Amber Clad_ fly overhead, her left engine smoking.

"that's not good. Think the Flood captured that?" Jun asked.

"don't know, don't care. I just wanna kill Truth and Mercy and get this war over with." John said very harshly. The SPARTAN's dispatched a couple of feuding Brutes and Grunts and reached the First Hanging Garden. There, the Covenant were trying to kill each other.

"we got two choices. Either we let them kill each other or-" John didn't get to finish his sentence as Carter, Kat, Jun, Emile and Richard charged the feuding Covenant and slaughtered them almost instantly.

"we can send the Three's down there to get rid of them." Jorge and Cortana said simultaneously.

"someone remind me to bomb this place with five NOVA bombs. If we have any remaining NOVA bombs." John sighed.

"at this moment, the Council is gathered on Halo, to see the Icon secured." Truth said over the comms.

"rise, pack brothers! Cast down the Elites!" Tartarus bellowed.

"there are those who said this day would never come. What have they to say now?" Truth asked.

"once the towers are clear, we'll drive them from the lower district!" the Brute Chieftain roared. The SPARTAN's paid no heed as they continued to the Second Hanging Gardens. There, they slaughtered the Covenant without heed and abandon. There, Truth continued to preach to High Charity.

"I have listened to the Oracle, and it confirmed our deepest hope. The Great Journey begins with Halo."

"the Elites are falling back to the Mausoleum! Fools, their Arbiter can do nothing for them now!"

"who would doubt the Prophets? What have they foretold that has not come to pass?"

"I really wish those guys would SHUT THE FUCK UP!" the SPARTAN's screamed in anger. Cortana just laughed at their unleashed anger. The angry SPARTAN's tore through any opposition they found. When they got to the mid tower,

"I think you might wanna sit this one out." Cortana said. The SPARTAN's used their anger to their advantage and absolutely slaughtered the Covenant. Even Energy Sword wielding Elites fell to the angry super-soldiers.

"this isn't good. I'm getting confirmed reports of Flood leaving In Amber Clad's wreckage. Let's get to the Index and find a way outta here, before things get really ugly!" Cortana urged. They ran away from the wreckage and found a massive grav lift. With no other choice, they jumped on, not knowing where it would take them. The lift took them down to a large landing platform where they saw two Phantoms take off and fly toward a large alien starship far away. Whatever it was, it was massive. They also saw the Prophet of Mercy with a Flood Infection Form on his neck.

"your pal, where's he going?" John asked.

"Earth… to finish what we started. And this time, none of you will survive." he gargled as John ripped the form off his neck, killing him.

"Cortana, that's a Forerunner ship, isn't it?" Kat asked.

"yes. If Truth gets onboard and takes it to Earth, they won't stand a chance." Cortana said.

"well that Brute has the Index. And Captain Keyes and Johnson. He can activate this ring." John said.

"if he does, I'll detonate the In Amber Clad's reactors. The blast will destroy High Charity and the ring. Not exactly an original plan, but we know it'll work." Cortana said. John reached for her.

"no. I don't want to chance a remote detonation. I'll have to stay here."

John took his helmet off.

"I'm not gonna do that. I'd rather lose Noble Team then leave you behind. I can't leave you behind again." John whispered to himself. Noble was too concentrated on the Dreadnaught to even care what was going on between John and Cortana.

"I'm sorry John, but I can't risk leaving a copy behind to destroy the reactors."

"I'm sorry that I jumped in that lake, got us all in this mess. Got you in all this." John said, his voice slightly breaking. Replacing his sorrow with hate and anger,

"I promise you I'll get you out. I promise." he said very determined, replacing his helmet. A Pelican then crashed on the walkway, Flood Combat Forms storming out.

"flood controlled drop-ships are touching down all over the city! That Gravemind was just using us! In Amber Clad was always it's intended vector. I see a conduit connecting this tower to that alien starship. Head back inside, I'll lead you to it." Cortana said. The SPARTAN's fought through the flood back into the tower. As they fought Covenant and Flood alike,

"shall we let the Flood consume our holy city? Turn High Charity into another of their wretched hives? No enemy has ever withstood our might. The Flood too shall fail." Truth said to try and re-assure his people.

"I'll do what I can to slow the launch sequence, but there's something stuck inside the ship. Some presences that's fighting back. If it's Covenant, it sure is stubborn." Cortana said. The SPARTAN's just killed whatever they saw. As they continued their bloodthirsty rampage,

"the parasite did not defeat the Forerunners. And it shall not defeat us." Truth said again.

"arrogant creature! Your deaths shall be instantaneous, while we suffer the progress of infinitude!" the Gravemind roared. When the SPARTAN's reached an opening in the tower,

"whosoever is gripped by fear, take heed. I am the Prophet of Truth, and I am not afraid. Noble Mercy is here by my side. His wise counsel ever in my ears."

"we exist together now….. Two corpses, in one grave." the Gravemind slimed. The SPARTAN's just ignored the rants of the two enemy leaders. When they reached the Prophet's private quarters,

"this crises will not be the end of us. It is but one last hurdle before the Great Journey begins, and everlasting salvation for all." Truth said. As the SPARTAN's tore their way through the Inner Sanctum,

"I'm reading Brute and Elite ships destroying each other all around High Charity. I'm running out of options, SPARTAN's. I can't stall the launch sequence forever. The next lift will take you directly to the conduit, hurry!"

"come on, run!" John yelled. When they finally reached another grav lift,

"I knew the Covenant were very good at repurposing Forerunner tech, but this is amazing. Get this, they're using the ship as a giant power source for High Charity!"

"so the ship's not really lifting off, so much as it's disconnecting from the power grid?" Kat asked.

"pretty much."

"damn, how the hell'd they do that?" Kat asked in wonder.

"who cares, let's just kill the bastard!" John yelled.

"now is the time of our unworlding, in a moment, we all shall become as… gods." Truth said over the speaker.

"you guys know the plan-catch Truth and kill him! I'll handle the Index! GO!" Cortana yelled.

"if you will falter, know this: one final effort is all that remains." Truth said before the comm cut off.

"forget about the flood, get on that ship!" Cortana urged the SPARTAN's as they tore through the last bit of Covenant and Flood. Jumping inside the conduit, they all flew towards the Forerunner Dreadnaught as it slowly took off. After the doors closed, the SPARTAN's flew inside the warship. John quickly closed off all his comms save to Cortana.

"after I'm through with Truth…"

"don't make a girl a promise… if you know you can't keep it."

"I promise I'll bring you back, even if I have to sacrifice the entire 141 to do so." John said. Cortana could only watch as the Forerunner Dreadnaught lifted off from High Charity. Once away from the doomed space station, it opened up a slipspace portal and headed to Earth.

November 3, 2552

Installation 05

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

Inside the massive super-carrier Rise of the Morning Sun, the Arbiter known as Thel' Vadem, the only Elite serving with the dominantly human Task Force 141 paced back and forth in the main armory. He hated doing this; he absolutely hated staying out of the fight when his friends were down there. Sighed, he had had enough. He grabbed a large M134 mini-gun and a clip that held up to 5 million rounds of ammunition. He replaced the handle for one that would fit his large hands. All the weapons had been modified where their grips and barrels could be changed to fit the Arbiter. He grabbed two Plasma Rifles, two M4A1 grenadier assault rifles, an M240 machine gun, a Browning M2 .50 cal HMG, 50 frag grenades, 55 plasma grenades, a China Lake modified with the proper grips, 15 grenades for the launcher, two Energy swords, a Samurai sword Takeo Masaki had given him long ago, and two Ka-bar combat knives. He also grabbed a Barrett M82 .50 cal sniper rifle, in case he had to tangle with an enemy sniper. He also stocked up in a large assortment of claymore mines and det-cord. After clipping all the weapons on his armor, he picked up the mini-gun and headed to the bridge. Everyone he came across immediately got out of his path, not wanting to occur the wrath of such a heavily armed Elite. When he got there,

"what are you doing, Thel?" Miranda asked.

"Captain Keyes and Sergeant Johnson are still captured by Tartarus. We lost contact the Chief and Noble Team a long time ago, so they're outta the question."

"what are you planning?" Miranda asked, slightly narrowing her eyes.

"I'm gonna bust 'em out, the captain and sergeant."

"just yourself?"

"yeah."

"look, Thel, your good, but you got a whole legion of Brutes down there. Even you can't fight your way through that." MacTavish said. For now, he was serving as the ship's XO.

"I gotta try."

"alright, let's say we do let you go. How many do you suspect they'd put down there?" Miranda said.

"5 legions. It's what I would do, they're expecting a massive army, not one single warrior. And the Brutes were never adept at stopping guerilla warfare." Thel said.

"alright. I'll stay here, give you as much time as I can. But I'll contact you if we get spotted, we might have to leave you here. If we do, I'm gonna bomb Halo with every nuke I got."

"I understand." Thel said. He turned around and began to leave the bridge.

"so what are you gonna do once you're down there, all those Brutes?" Hikowa asked.

"I'm gonna kill 'em all." Thel said coldly, cocking his mini-gun. He climbed in an HEV pod and steeled himself.

"once you hit the ground, you're own your own. I can't risk sending any more ships down, the Covenant know we're here now." Miranda said through the comm.

"I understand, Commander."

"Thel? Good Luck."

The pod jerked downwards and roared toward the Halo Ring. When the pod smashed into the ground, the hatch burst off and Thel humped out. No Brutes, not yet. _That's gonna change, soon enough_ he thought to himself. He ran through the rocks and hills of the ring, looking for a way to get inside the temple and rescue Captain Keyes and Sgt. Johnson. He then spotted a convoy of Brute vehicles.

"perfect. Just perfect." Thel smirked. Activating the cloak, which was heavily augmented using the same cloaks the MJOLNIR armor used, he lightly ran down the hill, not catching the attention of the Brutes. After quickly lining up the det-cord and claymores, he found some cover and pressed the detonator. The explosives went off, destroying most of the Wraiths and killing almost all of the Brutes. The hairy beasts were very disorganized; the veteran Elite used that to his advantage. He hopped up and let his mini-gun roar. The confused Brutes were quickly killed. Taking control of a lightly scrapped Ghost, he stepped on the gas and drove through the valley; that is, if you can 'drive' a Ghost, seeing as the damn thing floats. He soon came across a large group of Brutes and Grunts. He quickly hopped off the Ghost and opened fire on the Brutes. He then dropped the gun and pulled out his Energy Swords. The Brutes roared as they charge the lone Elite. The Arbiter bested them all; they all ended up dead with stab wounds in their hairy bodies. He deactivated the weapons and climbed back on the Ghost. He continued driving, not knowing where the temple was. He thought back; it suddenly hit him the like the force of a MAC round hitting a Covenant warship. _how the hell could I have been so fucking stupid?_ he thought to himself as he turned the craft around. He then spotted a Banshee that was conveniently lying in wait for him. Not caring if it was booby trapped, he hopped onboard and took off to the skies. As he was flying, he saw a line of Brutes and Elites hammering at each other. Although the Elites had the high ground, they were vastly outnumbered. _ah hell, might as well help 'em out_ he thought as he dove toward the ground. Firing the Fuel Rod Cannon and Plasma Cannons, he helped thin out the Brutes. He then jumped out of the craft, landing next to a Spec Ops Elite.

"Arbiter? Praise the Forerunners-"

"enough chit-chat, what the hell's going on?" Thel yelled, firing his mini-gun. The Elites were surprised to see him covered in human weaponry.

"the Brutes ambushed us this morning! I do not know what is going on!"

"simple, the Brutes are trying to replace the Elites!"

"vile beasts. The Prophets were fools to trust them."

"yeah, well, don't get your hopes up! The Counselors are dead, Brutes murdered them all! On orders from the Prophets!" Thel yelled. The Elites were stunned; the Prophets betrayed them.

"the Prophets have betrayed us, Arbiter!"

"put that in a memo and title it, 'shit I already know!' " Thel yelled. The Elites stared at him in confusion.

"those Brutes are coming in fast, and in large numbers!" a grunt squealed.

"Elites, hold this position! Don't let those hairy apes break through!" the Arbiter yelled, pulling out his grenade launcher and sending all his shells down range. One of the shells hit a large stockade of plasma grenades and fuel cells, causing them to erupt in a massive explosion, killing the Brutes.

"nice shot, Arbiter." a Elite minor complimented.

"keep up, or I'll leave all of you behind." he snarled coldly. He led the Elites and Grunts away from the valley and began humping up a large, rocky mountain. When they got to the top,

"what's that?" the Arbiter asked. He knew what it was, but he wanted to know if he was at the right place.

"where the councilors were meant to watch the consecration of the Icon. The start of the Great Journey." the elite replied.

"alright. Let's find a way in." the Arbiter said. Unfortunately, it took much longer then he originally thought. By the time he got there, a Scarab had already shot the doors to pieces and a Banshee fly toward the opening.

"who's in the Scarab?" a Grunt asked.

"don't know, don't care. Let's just get inside." the Arbiter sighed. Without a Banshee, however, it took a long time climbing the walls of the Forerunner structure. They managed to get inside, however.

"watch your corners. You see anything suspicious, shoot it." Thel ordered. The Elites were wondering how the hell did the Arbiter become so bloody-minded. As in, they wondered how he became so cynical and violent. As they neared the control room, they found Tartarus surrounded by his Brutes holding Captain Keyes hostage. He also saw the original Arbiter sneak up behind them. The Elites were very surprised by what they saw; there were _two_ Arbiters' now?

"come on, human. It is easy, put the icon in your hand…." Tartarus began, but Keyes shrugged him off.

"and do as you are told!" the brute grumbled.

"please, use caution! This reclaimer is delicate!" 343 Guilty Spark rang out.

"one more word, oracle, and I'll rip your eye from it's socket! Which is nothing compared to what I will do to you." he whispered to the Captain. Keyes struggled some more.

"Tartarus, stop." the original Arbiter said.

"impossible." Tartarus said, turning around.

"put the Icon down."

"put it down? And disobey the Hierarchs?"

Thel walked up and tapped the original Arbiter on the shoulder with his mini-gun. The original Arbiter turned around and was stunned to see himself, although the other Arbiter was heavily armed with human weaponry. Thel immediately grabbed the other Elites' neck, causing the two to merge. After a bright white light disappeared, only Thel' Vadem remained, aiming his mini-gun at Tartarus.  
>"what is going on here? Is this some trick?"<p>

"not that I know of. Put the icon down, let the human go and no one gets hurt. The Hierarchs don't understand Halo at all, what makes you think you do?" Thel said, cocking the mini-gun for emphasize.

"be careful Arbiter, or whatever you are. What you say is heresy." Thel simply scoffed.

"is it? Oracle, what is Halo's real purpose?"  
>"collectively, the seven rings-"<p>

"NO! NOT ANOTHER WORD!" Tartarus yelled at the monitor.

"please. Don't shake the light bulb." Sergeant Major Avery Johnson said, taking the .50 cal rifle off Thel's back, aiming it at the Brute's head.

"if you want to keep your brain in your head, tell your boys to chill!" Tartarus motioned for his brutes to fall back.

"go ahead, do your thing."

"the rings, what exactly are they?"

"weapons of last resort, built by the Forerunners to eliminate potential Flood hosts, thereby rendering the parasite harmless."

"and the Forerunners? What happened to them?"  
>"after exhausting every other strategic option, my makers activated the rings. They and all sentient life within three radii of galactic center, died, as planned."<p>

Thel smirked.

"would you like to see the relevant data?" Guilty Spark asked a little hesitantly.

"you're a blind fool, Tartarus, the prophets betrayed us."

Tartarus paused for a moment, then threw Guilty Spark at Johnson, knocking him down. He then grabbed Captain Keyes' hand and pushed the Index into the slot.

"no, Arbiter! The great journey has begun! And the Brutes, not the Elites, shall be the prophets' escorts!" Tartarus bellowed. Captain Keyes jumped away, helping Johnson get to his feet. Thel unclipped his two M4 rifles and their ammunition and gave them to the captain.

"I'll take care of him." Thel said coldly. He ran forward and jumped off the platform as more Elite reinforcements arrived to help their leader. As the Brutes and Elites did war on the platform,

"charging sequence initiated. Primary generators coming online." Guilty Spark reported.

"well, shut them down!" Captain Keyes yelled, firing his M4 rifle at the brutes.

"apology. Protocol does not allow me to interfere with any aspect of this sequence."

"then how the hell do I stop it?" Keyes argued.

"well, it will take some time to go over the proper procedures-"

"quit stalling, dammit!" Keyes swore.

"well, under more controlled circumstances, I would suggest the Reclaimer simply remove the Index." Spark said honestly.

"that's it? Sergeant, cover me!" Keyes yelled.

"hang tight, sir! Not until that brute is dead! Hey, Mohawk! How does that feel?" Johnson yelled, bringing down Tartarus' shields. Unfortunately, Tartarus was a little too fast. Probably because Thel was being weighed down by all his weapons. And any Elite that tried to get him, they were smashed by his hammer. So the fight continued as more Brute Jumpers arrived, causing the Elites to shift their focus.

"secondary generators charging. All systems are performing well within operational parameters." Spark said.

"you're telling me that you can't stop the sequence?" Keyes yelled, firing a grenade down range.

"reclaimer, please understand that interrupting the wave generation process will severely damage this installation." Spark said, not giving the answer Cpt. Keyes wanted.

"gimme a direct answer!" Keyes yelled.

"I am but a Monitor. The reclaimer can do as it likes."

Keyes swore; he was really beginning to hate Forerunner technology.

"Thel, you kill that Brute yet?" Johnson yelled.

"is the space pope reptilian?" Thel snarled back.

"no." Johnson said, confused by the question.

"then you have your answer!" Thel angrily yelled. As the fight continued,

"power generation phase complete. The installation is ready to fire. Starting final countdown." Spark said a little cheerfully.

"come on, Arbiter! Kick that hairy apes ass!" Johnson yelled.

"firing sequence initiated. And may I say, Reclaimers, it has been a pleasure to serve you both. Goodbye." Spark said, flying away.

"I really hate that bastard." Keyes growled, firing his rifle. Thel decided enough was enough. He dropped all his weapons save for the samurai sword and pulled it out.

"what sort of weapon is that?" he asked.

"the weapon that's gonna kill you." Thel growled. Instead of performing many elegant moves that would certainly tire him out, he simply flipped the blade around and flung it at the Brute. The sharpened steel sliced through the Brute's skull and brain. Death was instantaneous. The barriers and platform began to rotate and spin. Captain Keyes quickly jumped down and avoided the spinning platforms. Grabbing the Index, he yanked it out while aiming his rifle around the room, waiting for any more Brutes to arrive. The room continued to shake, then it suddenly stopped. Guilty Spark arrived, carrying Sgt Johnson with the sniper rifle on his back. A holographic depiction of an unknown object appeared in the center of the room.

"what's that?" Captain Keyes asked, shouldering his rifle.

"a beacon." Spark replied.

"what's it doing?"  
>"communication. At superluminal speeds-"<p>

"communicating with what?" Keyes snapped.

"the other installations."

"show me."

The image changed to show the rest of the Halo Rings.

"Fail Safe protocol: in the event of unexpected shutdown, the entire system will move to standby status. All remaining platforms are now ready for remote activation."

"from where, here?"  
>"don't be ridiculous." Spark said, patronizing the humans.<p>

"tell me the truth, where would someone go to activate the other rings?" Keyes snapped angrily. He wanted the truth right now.

"why, the Ark. Of course." Spark said, baffled by the human's supposed ignorance.

"and where, Oracle, is that?" Thel asked.

"that don't matter at the moment. What does matter is getting back to the ship and getting the hell back to Earth, warn Fleet Command of what happened here. Thel, did you bring anything we could use to contact the Morning Sun?" Captain Keyes asked. The Elite tossed a radio to the captain.

"Rise of the Morning Sun, this is Captain Keyes, request an immediate extract. Miranda, talk to me. That's an order, Commander." Keyes said, a little worried that his daughter might be dead.

"dad, is that you?" Miranda said, breaking Navy protocol. At that moment, however, no one really cared.

"it's me, Miranda. I'm right here. Send a Pelican down if you can, we need to get back to Earth ASAP." Keyes said, tears welling up in his eyes.

"head out to the platform, I'll have a ship waiting for you. It's good to you have you back."

"good to be back, Miranda." Keyes said, sighing with great relief. Everyone gathered themselves up and headed to the outer platform. A Pelican dropship then landed on the outer platform and took the Arbiter, Captain Keyes, Sgt. Johnson and 343 Guilty Spark to the UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun. They saw the wreckages of dozens of Brute-controlled warships and Elite-controlled carriers and cruisers glassing the Ring.

"Miranda, I'm coming onboard. Once we're on, take us to Earth as fast as we can. We gotta inform Command of what happened here." Keyes said. Once they got onboard, they stepped into the teleporter and teleported themselves to the bridge. Keyes immediately threw up in the nearest trash can.

"yeah, that'll do that to you on the first turn." Richtofen said lazily, focusing on the data screen in front of him.

"get us to Earth, right now."

"yes sir." Ensign Lovell said.

"I'm glad you made it back, dad." Miranda said, hugging her father.

"I'm okay, I'm here." he sighed, hugging his daughter back. The warship entered slipspace and headed back towards Earth.

"Professor Brown, can we add more juice to the engines and reactors, make this ship go faster?" Keyes asked.

"I'm giving it all she's got. I can't give you anything else."

"what about that element you brought onboard, what's it called, one-one-five, can we use that to increase our speed, make us go faster?"

"it's very possible, but that would be the first time we've done it. We honestly don't know what'll happen."

"do it."

"alright then. Redirecting Element 115 from the Wunderwaffe Cannons to the main reactor and engines." Brown said, typing in the command. The ship then received a massive boost that sent everyone slightly backwards.

"did it work?" Keyes asked.

"yes, it did. Ladies and gentleman, we have successfully completed the first energy transfer while within a slipspace realm." Brown said. No one clapped, however. Considering all the hell they've been through, making it back to Earth alive in one piece would've been a good job well done.

"can you estimate the date we'll arrive at Earth?" Keyes asked.

"bear in mind, this is an estimate. I would say, November 21. Bear that it's an estimate, however."

"alright. Gimme a sitrep on our ship, what's the damage?" Captain Keyes ordered.

"we didn't suffer much damage at all. Some minor fluctuations in the main EPS conduit grid, two of our teleporters had to be taken off line for repair, and ATAF turrets five through twelve are down for repairs. Considering what this ship has been through, it could be much, much worse." Miranda said.

"alright. I'm ordering that the crew go to the cryopods. We need the sleep."

"sir?" MacTavish asked.

"don't worry, Major. I'll wake everyone up when we hit Earth." Keyes reassured. Most of the bridge crew left. It was only Captain Keyes, Dr. Richtofen, Ens. Lovell, Lt. Dominique, and Lt. Hikowa. So the bridge was very, very, empty.

"alright. Let's get the hell home." captain Keyes said, sitting in the command chair.

November 15, 2552

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

Sol System

After weeks of traveling through slipspace, they were nearing their destination.

"November 15. That's faster then what we anticipated. All hands, this is Captain Keyes. We are entering the Sol System. I want all decks and stations to be battle ready within 5 minutes, we will be leaving slipspace very soon. Captain Keyes out." Keyes said, cutting the comm. In a record time, the entire ship was battle ready. The bridge was now filled with all the naval personal it required.

"how's our velocity?"

"we're slowing down sir, we're nearing the exit point." Lovell said.

"Ensign Lovell, gimme the wheel." Keyes said. Captain Keyes replaced Ensign Lovell at the navigation console.

"exiting slipspace in 3...2.…1, exiting now!" Richtofen yelled out. The ship suddenly appeared in front of a large orbiting space station. Keyes immediately fired the emergency thrusters, sending the ship upwards to avoid smashing the smaller station.

"we got covenant battle cruisers on our port! They're charging weapons!" Hikowa cried out.

"raise the shields! Arm all turrets, give 'em a broadside! When their shields are down, pound them with missile pods A1 through Q5! Do it now!" Keyes yelled as he turned the massive ship away from the tangled mess of destroyed human and Covenant warships. However, in doing so, he smashed into a UNSC frigate, destroying it on impact.

"Captain Keyes, what the hell are you doing?" Admiral Hood yelled out.

"take it outta my paycheck, Admiral! I got a war to fight!" Keyes snapped.

"when your done with that Covenant warship, send your men over to the station you nearly pasted! We got a Tier One asset we grabbed at New Mombassa that needs immediate interrogation!" Hood ordered.

"yes sir, just let me destroy this fucking cruiser." Keyes snarled. After the enemy ship was destroyed,

"Major MacTavish?"

"sir!"

"take the 141 and get in that facility. Hood says there's something on that station we need to interrogate. Use any means to extract whatever you can."

"uh, sir?" Soap said pointing out the view screen towards New Mombassa, or the remains of it.

"what the hell happened to New Mombassa?" Keyes asked.

"looks like it was nuked. I'm also reading some interesting readings down there….no, that can't be possible." Brown said.

"what isn't possible?" Keyes asked.

"hey, check it out. Looks like the Brutes are trying to dig something up at the ruins." MacTavish said, pointing to the Covenant dig site.

"Captain, I need that asset interrogate right now." Hood ordered.

"alright. Get on that station and pull out all in information this asset possesses."

"yes sir." MacTavish said, cocking his rifle. As he left the bridge,

"go easy on the asset, Soap." Price said.

"you worry too much, old man." Soap lightly chuckled. The 141 grabbed their guns and waited at the airlock. Everyone was there except Miranda and the Arbiter. They didn't know what they were doing and they didn't care. After some rumbling,

"okay, airlock secure. Find out what the asset knows."

"yes sir."

The airlock opened to reveal two UNSC Marines, who immediately saluted MacTavish. The large squad of Marines just pushed past them without saluting back, leaving the Marines wondering what they did wrong. They continued walking down the hall until they met Captain Dare. The two saluted.

"Major."

"Captain. Scuttlebutt has it that you guys got something I'm interrogating." MacTavish said a little coldly.

"right this way. Now Lord Hood may have given you clearance, but it was my op, and it's my interrogation. We only captured one. It's very delicate."

"pfft. Right. Okay, I'll try and be careful with the bastard." MacTavish said very coldly as he opened the door. The asset was an Engineer working on a piece of equipment. Perched around the room was General Shepherd, Sgt. Foley, Cpl. Dunn, Pvt. Ramirez, and Buck's ODST squad.

"so, this thing have access to the entire Covie B-net?" MacTavish asked as the rest of the 141 walked in.

"limited, but yes. We're not sure how it manages a remote connection-"

MacTavish silence Dare by tossing his lighter to the alien. The ODST's reacted.

"STAY THE FUCK WHERE YOU ARE, YOU WANNA GET SHOT TOO?" MacTavish bellowed out, the 141 immediately drawing their weapons on the squad. Fighting the Flood back on the Halo ring left them very jumpy and willing to kill whatever they saw. The ODST's saw that in their eyes. That made them all wonder what the hell happened to them, whoever they went.

"hey, where's the SPARTAN's?" Mickey asked slowly.

"dead, lost, defected to the Covenant, I don't fucking know. I'm going with the last one that they switched sides." MacTavish said, stepping closer to the alien.

"the Brutes. The fucking hairy apes who put bombs on your people and killed billions of mine. They're digging themselves one big fucking hole. You're gonna tell me what the fuck they're looking for. And then, you're gonna fucking tell me how I can fucking stop 'em." MacTavish said, coldly, putting a cigar in his mouth while aiming his M4 rifle at the Engineer's head. If Soap threatened the alien, the Engineer didn't seem to notice it as it flicked open Soap's lighter and lit his cigar. Looking down at his burning cigar, a bare smile appeared on the major's lips.

* * *

><p><strong>Like? Don't like? read and review, and if my characters seem a little OOC, or if I need to improve my writing any way possible, please inform me so I will do so.<strong>


	10. Chapter 9

**Disclaimer: Aren't you getting tired of these disclaimers? I am. Anyway, you all know what I own and what I don't own. Sorry I took a bit long to post this one.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 9<p>

November 14th, 2552

Crows Nest, Chawia Hill, 24 kilometers west of Voi, Kenya

"dammit, I need those sensors back on line!" Shepherd hollered.

"I'm trying sir, but this damn base is centuries old! Damn electricity keeps conking out on us!" Dempsey growled, welding some wires into the wall.

"I'm not looking for excuses, get those sensors running! We don't know where the Covenant are at, and we need to launch an ambush soon or they'll find us!" Shepherd ordered. General Shepherd had taken command of Crow's Nest several weeks ago and rallied over 15,200 men and women at his command. It wasn't as much as he wanted, but he realized that Earth was running low on Marines. So most of his forces were from the Army. He simply made due with what he had. But he definitely wished HIGHCOM had given him a more advanced base then Crow's Nest.

"AA?"  
>"working."<br>"automated turrets?"  
>"in place."<p>

"minefield?"  
>"no one's crossed it yet. The Covenant probably don't know where here."<p>

"alright, send out the 4th Platoon, see where the Covenant are."

"sir, I'm picking up something on the radar. I'm seeing four, no five…. Correction six objects coming toward us at high speed. Size configuration is… crap, it's humanoid." Brown said.

"could it be Jumper Brutes?" MacTavish asked.

"could be something else." Shepherd grunted.

"either way, I say we shoot first and ask questions later." Brown said, pulling out an BR55HB rifle.

"wait a minute. I'm picking up the objects. I'm reading, UNSC IFF signatures." Richtofen said.

"great, Covies are using our own signals against us." Price sighed.

"maybe. Signal the entire base to be at Alert 1 Alpha. Gimme a radio contact with the unknowns, send hostile challenge and ID recognition. And put the reply on the speakers." Shepherd ordered.

"unidentified hostiles, this is Cookie Nestle. Identify yourself immediately or you will be fired upon. This is your only warning." Brown said, believing Shepherd to be making a mistake. A little bit later, they heard a familiar voice crackle over the speakers.

"….. _this is Sierra-Alpha-two-five-niner leading SPARTAN team NOBLE. Request permission to enter the base, Cookie Nestle_."

"looks like they made it. They're back. Tell all units to stand down, but be on their guard. And give Noble Team co-ordinates as to where the front door is. And once they're inside, they're to report to me immediately, here in the CIC." Shepherd said, puffing on his cigar. A while later, six SPARTAN super-soldiers walked in, all covered in blood with banged up armor.

"Commander."

"General."

The two saluted and then stood at ease.

"where's the Chief?" Mickey asked.

"damn bastard pushed us off the ship, said he was gonna stay behind. Something about tying up loose ends." Carter scoffed.

"what loose ends, what ship? We haven't detected any Covenant warships in the vicinity yet, at least none with a SPARTAN transponder on it."

"because the damn thing's not Covenant. And sure as hell it ain't human." Kat snapped.

"then what is it? The alien race who made the rings, did they make this ship you're talking about?" Makarov asked.

"probably. But I'm not holding out any hope that he's still alive, there's well over a thousand soldiers on that thing, we barely got out ourselves." Carter sighed.

"can you at least describe what it looks like?" Shepherd gritted his teeth. Carter took notice of his barely-restrained anger. Carter got to his full height and pressed the general against the wall. Shepherd looked the SPARTAN in his eyes, although he had to look up to do it.

"no, I can't describe what it looks like. But trust me when I say that you'll know it when you see it." Carter said very coldly.

"and when's that supposed to happen?"  
>"I don't fucking know." Carter replied.<p>

"um, instead of trying to kill each other, shouldn't we be trying to kill the Covenant instead?" Dutch asked.

"so what are you orders, general?" Carter said a little bitterly. He was still very pissed off that John kicked him and the rest of Noble off the Dreadnaught without any explanation except 'I'm staying to tie up a few loose ends.'

"I'm sending Noble out with the 4th Platoon. It's strictly a recon mission, tally up how many forces they have and where they might attack. Don't engage them under any circumstances." Shepherd growled.

"yes sir." Carter replied.

November 17th, 2552

Near Mt. Kilimanjaro, Tanzania, Africa, Earth

"this ain't good at all, this ain't good at all." Dempsey said in shock.

"how far do you think he fell?" Kennedy asked.

"well over two klicks, easy. I'm just surprised he survived." Buck said.

"everyone, stay sharp!" Carter ordered. The Task Force 141 surrounded the fallen soldier, ready to take down any Covenant they saw.

"Doc?" Carter asked.

"alright, let me check." the veteran professor said.

"well, his armor is in full-lock down. The gel layer could've taken most of the impact, but at this point, I'm not hopeful." Brown said. Dutch leaned in closer and pressed his fingers to the soldier's neck.

"I'm not getting anything." Dutch muttered, pulling the data-chip out John's helmet.

"alright, some call for VTOL, heavy lift gear. We're not leaving him here." Carter ordered.

"yeah, you're not." John-117 growled, grabbing Dutch's arm and pulling himself up.

"damn fool. Why the hell do you always jump? One of these days, you're gonna end up landing on something more stubborn then you! And I'm not the bits and pieces kind of guy." Johnson chastised the SPARTAN. John wrenched the data-chip out of Dutch's hand without saying a word, staring down at it.

"where's Cortana?" Veronica asked.

"_don't make a girl a promise_…_if you know you can't keep it._"

"she stayed behind." John said, putting the chip back in his helmet. The tone of his voice suggested that no one further the inquiry on the subject. The Arbiter then uncloaked himself.

"were we followed?" Carter asked.

"unfortunately, yes. They followed our scent. And by scent, I mean all the tobacco and alcohol we're carrying." Thel said, glaring at Doc Brown, Makarov, Nikolai Belinsky, Mickey, John-117, Castro, MacTavish, Price, Jun-266, Johnson, Roebuck, and Dutch. All of them were heavy smokers and drinkers.

"not my problem." they all replied, taking a smoke and drink.

"alright, let's get the hell outta here." Carter ordered.

"hey Carter, did you and the Three's ever take those drugs again?" John asked.

"what drugs?" Roebuck asked.

"what, none of you know?" Kat asked. The only people who knew the S-III's need certain drugs were Richtofen, Brown, the III's, Jorge, John, and Cortana. Surprisingly, everyone else in the unit didn't know.

"none of you know?" Kat asked again.

"know what?" Foley asked.

"the III's were augmented by using drugs, not surgery like the II's. As a result, our frontal lobes were heavily augmented to the point where if we don't take certain drugs to calm us down, we become very aggressive. And I mean, we make the Brutes look like they don't know the first thing about killing." Jun said.

"huh. I'd like to see that, one of these days." Joseph said.

"no you don't!" John and Jorge both yelled.

"why not?" Makarov asked, drinking more scotch.

"you just don't. Now let's get the hell outta here." John ordered, taking his rightful place as the main CO of the TF-141.

"alright. 1st squad, you're my scouts. Move as quiet as you can." Johnson ordered. As the Task Force 141 moved through the thick jungle,

"Bravo Team, this is MacTavish, we found Sierra-117. Fall back to the exfil point, over." Soap uttered over the comm.

"Roger that, Major. Reynolds out." Sgt. Reynolds replied. as they continued humping through the jungle, the sound of a Brute roaring was heard.

"that was close." Polonsky muttered.

"just stay on your guard, Polonsky. We'll get through this." Roebuck assured.

"Carter, be advised. Hostiles are…on the move….I got eyes on….Brute Pack…over."

"say again, Sergeant, your breaking up." Carter said. A Loyalist Phantom then flew overhead.

"okay, now that was close." Chernov muttered.

"alright, we're gonna have to split up. We stay together, we're gonna get spotted. We'll split up, and meet back at the LZ. Dare, Foley, Reznov, take your squads and go with Sgt. Johnson. He's taking Second Squad. Everyone else is with me. Keep your eyes wandering, don't stay focused on one object. And keep your ears open. Let's move." John ordered. That only left him with the SPARTAN's, Makarov's squad, Soap's squad, Richtofen's squad, the Arbiter and Doc Brown.

"alright, let's keep moving. Stay low and stay quiet." John ordered.

"Phantom, 3 0'clock high. Brutes got power armor." Dempsey muttered.

"smoke 'em." John growled. The small waterfall was alive with the sounds of gunfire.

"that took care of them." Brown muttered, reloading his gun.

"when the war is finished, I vote that we go destroy these savages' Homeworld." Thel growled.

"when the time's right, Thel. Just be patient." Carter calmed down the angry Elite. The squad moved through a nearby cave and found what they immediately dubbed 'Grunt Camp.'

"dumb fuckers are asleep. Let's waste 'em." Kat suggested. They did just that; the forest was shredded with absolute gunfire as the Grunts and Jackals were splattered across the forest walls and ground. As they stepped through the shot-up encampment, they found a Brute Captain holding Sgt. Reynolds by the neck.

"tell me it's location!" the Brute roared.

"kiss… my… ass." Reynolds moaned. The Brute found a Kukri in his head; death was instantaneous.

"Brute Chieftain, Commander. Pinned my unit, killed my men, sir." Reynolds sighed.

"Not my problem you Marines aren't as good as SPARTAN's." Carter said very coldly as he reloaded his DMR. John couldn't blame him; 30 years of fighting made the 141 very cold and ignorant to everyone else's suffering. The humans ran through another cave and jumped down a small slope. John then had another 'Cortana Moment.'

_Could you sacrifice me to complete your mission? Could you watch me die?_

"uh, sir, you alright?" Brown asked.

"your vitals just pinged KIA. Something wrong, Chief?" Emile asked.

"I'm fine." John said coldly. After leaving they cave, they found Second Squad holed up in some sort of substation with two Pelicans providing cover fire.

"let's get down there and help 'em out." John muttered.

"Kilo two-five, you got incoming bandits, over." Carter warned.

"say again, commander?" the pilot asked.

"you got Banshee's coming right at you! Pull up, now!" Kat yelled. Her warning came too late; the Banshee's destroyed the Pelicans and sent them down the river, in a manner of speaking. One Pelican, however, was literally sent down river as it sunk to the bottom.

"well, that sucks." Jun muttered, sniping another Brute.

"we can't stay here, let's move. Wait, what about our Hueys?" John asked.

"we got 'em stashed up on the Sun, we can't afford to lose those birds. We now only use them in the most dire of circumstances." Makarov said, reloading his rifle.

"alright, let's keep moving. And keep killing." John ordered. The platoon ran back into the forest, hoping not to catch the attention of the Banshee's. They then ran into what they called 'Sniper Alley.'

"do we have any major air support?" John yelled.

"nothing at the moment! Why do you ask?" Carter yelled.

"that's why!" John yelled, pointing to two Loyalist dropships flying overhead.

"shit." MacTavish swore. After killing all the Jackals,

"there's the bridge, get to it!" Ghost yelled, firing his M4A1 rifle. They found the rest of the Task Force 141 running across the bridge, firing back at the Brutes.

"come on, you dumb apes! You want breakfast, you gotta catch it!" Johnson yelled. A Phantom was busy holding position near the edge of a waterfall.

"bad position for your phantom!" Victor and Lev yelled, tossing large packages of home-made explosives which stuck on the ship's engine. The explosion was enough to rip through the armor, destroy the engine, kill the Chieftain inside and sent it flying. After killing the last of the Covenant,

"through the cave, now!" Carter yelled. On the other side was a large dam controlled by the Loyalists.

"Jun, you see that Chieftain?" John asked.

"yeah, I got him." the SPARTAN sniper muttered. Taking aim, he sighted in on the Chieftain's head and squeezed the trigger. The entire camp was then in a large ruckus, mostly because their chieftain was now headless. The group used that to their advantage, slaughtering the grunts and jackals. The brutes presented a little challenge, but they were no match for the angry SPARTAN's.

"alright, everyone cross-check your ammo and water. Covies are gonna come back, that's for sure. Find some cover, and get ready. They'll bring in two dropships and drop the troops off at the bridge and the east and west platforms." John ordered.

"how do you know that?" Dempsey asked, reloading his rifle.

"it's what I'd do." John muttered, cutting the power on the force-field prison cell.

"thanks Chief." Roebuck muttered, grabbing a Covenant Carbine.

"so, what are your orders?" Buck asked.

"find some cover, and don't get killed. You're no use to me dead." John snarled.

"nice, real nice." Romeo said, picking up a Brute Plasma Rifle.

"Phantom's, coming in hot! When they drop their troops, hit 'em with everything we got!" MacTavish yelled. A massive gunfight then ensued, resulting in the Covenant ground forces being slaughtered. The 141 didn't have anything to take down the Phantoms; they didn't bring any SPARTAN Lasers or Rocket Launchers because they had to travel light for this mission.

"Hocus, ETA, over!" Carter demanded. Nothing came in over the comms.

"Carter, any word on that evac?" John yelled.

"nothing yet!"

"dammit, get on the horn and get Hocus over here, even if she's dead, you hear me?"

"yes sir!" Carter sarcastically replied. The first Phantom suddenly exploded.

"what was that?" Dare coughed.

"looks like our evac is here." Mickey muttered, pointing at two Pelicans. They were firing their missiles at the second Phantom, destroying it and sending it to the river.

"Commander, this is Kilo 023. Sorry that we couldn't call you, Covenant deployed jammers in my area."

"thanks anyway, lt." Carter sighed. The war-weary marines, ODST's, SPARTAN's, and single Elite boarded the Pelicans.

"thanks Chief, for busting us out." Sgt. Foley sighed.

"we ain't outta this yet, we still got a war to fight." John said very coldly, staring out the back of the Pelican. He removed his helmet and took a very long drag.

"we'll get her back, Chief. I know we will." Carter reassured his fellow SPARTAN.

"doc? Will she remain metastable, even with… you know?" John asked.

"no, I don't know. What is it?" Emmett asked, taking a shot of scotch. John sat down on the edge of the blood tray, letting his legs dangle. He then tapped the spot next to him, motioning for Doc Brown to sit down. After hooking himself up to the cables so he wouldn't fall out, he sat down.

"the very last time I left her behind, the Gravemind somehow managed to torture her. I don't know how he did it, I don't wanna know how, but she damn near fell into rampancy when I busted her out. I have to know if she'll remain metastable back on High Charity." John whispered.

"I'm sorry, John, but the only way I can help you is if you get me all the records on Cortana, specifically, the records concerning when she was held captive."

"dammit, when we started this whole damn thing, you made her metastable, are you telling me-"

"I can make her metastable again, John, but I don't have the necessary equipment to do so back on the ship. I'd have to back to Ft. Ticonderoga to pull that off."

"if she dies, you die. You understand me?" John said very coldly to his friend.

"John, listen me. I've been your friend for over 29 years. I brought Cortana to metastability, I helped create the Task Force 141, I even tried to help you stop the war. Now, if you wanna kill me when this is all over, I won't try and stop you. But I am the only one who can save her. Do you really wanna risk that?" Brown said. John hated, absolutely hated, the fact that Brown was absolutely right.

"I'm not gonna kill you, but do what you can when I bust her out." John said softly.

"I promise I'll do everything in my power to save her. Besides, I'm working on another project that might benefit Cortana, as well as you."

"what, like another set of MJOLNIR armor, the Mark Eight? That'd actually be pretty bad ass, if you ask me." John said.

"technically, I am building another suit of armor, but it's not for the SPARTAN's. And no, the project I'm working on isn't another suit of armor."

"what is it?"  
>"I'll let you know when the time's right. It's need to know, only. Right now, I'm the only one in the entire task force that needs to know." Brown said with a smirk. John didn't push it, he knew Brown had his secrets. And some of his secrets he didn't want to know.<p>

2 hours later…..

"IFF confirmed. Contact is Pelican dropships Kilo 023 and Kilo 024. Over." the UNSC Marine Sentry rang out.

"roger that, what's the word Kilo two-three?" the LSO asked.

"Sierra 117 is onboard. Request permission to land, over."

"deck is yours, come on down." the LSO responded. The Marine sentries bumped their fists and smiled. The two Pelican's descended into the landing strip, readying to offload their trigger-happy passengers. Down in the bay, several wounded marines were being rushed to the sickbay. Several wounded Marines were resting on some crates when they spotted John-117 and Noble Team hop off their Pelican.

"hey, check it out."

"no way? SPARTAN's?"

"for real? You guys better not be-" a blinded Marine began.

"no, they're here man, they're all here! We're gonna be okay, we're all gonna be okay now!"

General Shepherd then stepped out, his M4A1 grenadier assault rifle strapped on his back and his .44 Magnum revolvers at his waists.

"so where'd you find him?" Shepherd asked.

"taking a nap out back." Johnson a little wearily. He received a glare from the general that basically said, 'don't fuck with me or I'm gonna kill you.'

"I'll bet. Good to see you again, Chief."

"good to be back, General." John said, the two men shaking hands.

"I'll get you up to speed. Truth's ship and his fleet managed to smash through the Lunar perimeter, burned what was left of Home Fleet. After that, they started bombing us. And they hit us bad, as you can tell." Shepherd said, referring to the many wounded lying in the hallways.

"Truth could've landed his forces anywhere on Earth. For some reason, he put all his forces here at East Africa. More specifically, the ruins of New Mombassa."

"yeah, after he nuked it." Buck said.

"what's he talking about?"  
>"I nuked New Mombassa to try and stop the Covenant from digging something up, lost a ton of men in the process. Our intel suggests that Truth is now looking for something called The Ark. From what little we've been able to gather and what Captain Keyes has informed me, Truth is looking for this Ark where he can activate something called Halo. Personally, I don't know what it is, and I don't care what it is. Is Admiral Hood on the line yet?" Shepherd asked. John suddenly realized that Shepherd didn't ask Captain Keyes about what Truth was after, what the Halo rings were really for. That would have to wait, for now.<p>

"good news, General Shepherd?" Admiral Hood asked.

"as good as I can bring you, admiral." Shepherd said, lighting a cigar. He didn't care what the admiralty and top brass thought of his smoking.

"so I see. What's your status, son?"

"green, sir." John replied a little stiffly.

"glad to hear it. General's come up with a good plan. We could've pulled it off with Noble, but once I heard you were planetside, I wanted to make sure we got you back in the fight."

"Truth has his ships clustered all around the artifact above that dig site. Not to mention his infantry has deployed AA batteries all around his perimeter. To try and send everything we got against all that would be total suicide. So if we neutralize a small chunk of his defenses…."

"I'll order a low-level strike. Hit 'em right where it hurts. I only have a handful of ships, Master Chief. It's an awful big risk, but I'm rather confident-" Hood was cut off when the power suddenly died.

"dammit, not again." Kat swore.

"switch to emergency generators!" Shepherd yelled.

"shielding failed. They're down and charging."

"as soon as they're up, get Admiral Hood back online. Tell him-"

"you are, all you, vermin. Cowering in the dirt, thinking what, I wonder? That you might escape the coming fire? No. Your world will burn until its surface is but glass! And not even your Demons will live to creep, blackened from its hole to mar the reflection of our passage... the culmination of our Journey. For your destruction is the will of the gods! And I? I am their instrument!" Truth declared, broadcasting his sermon on the large screens. After the power came back on,

"cocky bastard. Loves to run his mouth." Shepherd muttered, smoking his cigar.

"does he always mention the SPARTAN's?" John cynically asked.

"alright, that's it. I'm giving the order to close up shop. Get all the wounded out right now; call all our troopers in right now! We're gonna get hit very hard. More then likely we'll be invaded. Get the wounded out, that's our priority." Shepherd ordered.

"general, all squad leaders are requesting a rally point. Where should they go?" a Marine asked.

"tell 'em to go to war." Shepherd said, pulling the bolt back on his rifle.

"okay, we just lost the perimeter trackers."

"motions trackers?"

"either they're down or we're not receiving. Can't tell."  
>"any birds squawking?"<p>

"not yet. Wait, overwatch has something. Covenant Phantoms, closing in to our position."

"alright. Any birds less than 5 minutes out, bring 'em in. Everything else is to scatter."

"yes sir."

"who would've thought we'd have this many wounded?"  
>"Pelicans are gonna take extra time to load up."<p>

"well quite your bitching and use your hands. They'd find us eventually, but we got a plan. So let's make it happen! Move out!" Shepherd ordered.

"yes sir!" the Marines and Army Troopers responded.

"alright. Thel, the 141 and I will stay here to guard the CIC. Chief, take the SPARTAN's and head downstairs. Troopers will need your help." MacTavish suggested. The SPARTAN's literally hopped the rails and stocked up on all the weapons they found.

"wow, you SPARTAN's can do a lot, don't you?" a Marine asked, rather impressed.

"much more then you Marines could ever do." Emile said, not realizing he insulted the Marine. After running through a large cave where the Troopers were setting up several HMG's.

"alright, I have a feeling the Covenant are gonna bust through the Hanger. So let's get down there and help 'em out." John said.

"how do you know?" Carter asked. After the base shook and the PSA announced that the hanger was now under attack,

"lucky guess?" John smirked.

"Chief, can you hear me?" Shepherd asked.

"yeah."

"good. Secure link. Listen, my fire teams are spread rather thin, so I can't hold out for a while. I want that hanger cleared, ASAP." Shepherd ordered.

"just let me get there, you'll get your hanger." John promised. Opening the door, they witnessed a Warthog being destroyed.

"there goes our support." Emile said.

"we're SPARTAN's, we don't need any support." John said, only to rally his troops. John and Noble cleared the littered vehicle access and ran through the many hallways and corridors to the main Hanger Bay.

"that's a lot of soldiers." Jun remarked.

"just get to sniping." John ordered. After clearing the hanger,

"thanks a lot, SPARTAN's. Couldn't have done it with you." the Troopers commented.

"just get on that Pelican." John said.

"SPARTAN's, I need you back to the Op center, ASAP." Shepherd ordered. The SPARTAN's turned around and ran back to the CIC. Back in the vehicle access, they heard the sound of Drones in the air vents.

"you hear that?" Kat asked.

"yeah, and I don't like it." Jorge grumbled.

"Attention, hostiles have been reported outside the barracks! I repeat, the barracks are under attack! All available combat teams, respond, now! I need a sitrep, any squad leaders, report to the Op Center immediately!" Shepherd's voice rang out.

"they're all dead, Shepherd. Your wasting your time." John muttered coldly. When they got back in the caves,

"fuck, Drones!" Richard yelled, firing his DMR.

"what the heck are these things?" a Marine asked.

"Drones! Take 'em down, short controlled bursts!" Sgt. Stacker yelled. After killing all the Drones,

"SPARTAN's get to the Op Center right now! Shepherd needs your help!" an Army Trooper yelled. Inside the CIC, several Marines were busy arming up a large bomb. General Shepherd was on the screen.

"if I try to hook up a timer, I might go off just by itself." Sgt Foley said, working on the bomb.

"MacTavish?"  
>"sir?"<br>"put that out. SPARTAN's, take a look. A going away present for the Covies. We got it linked up to smaller charges all around the facility. Soap, as soon as the evac is finished, start the timer."

"yes sir, General."

"good luck. I'll see you on the last Pelican out."

"where are the barracks?" John asked.

"here. Get down there, save those men. Brutes ain't much for mercy, Chief." MacTavish said, pulling up the schematics on the screen.

"alright. You get this bomb armed and ready. And get the hell out as soon as you can." John ordered, grabbing more ammo. Running through the Motor Pool through several empty corridors, they found a large Brute Pack. The SPARTAN's wasted no time killing the aliens.

"I just love how we just kill whoever we see, especially if it's Covenant." Jun said.

"that's our job, Noble 3." Carter reminded. John had another Cortana moment, but did his best to ignore it as the SPARTAN's jumped into an air shaft. Running down the corridor and killing the drones, they jumped down to find Thel firing a his Plasma Rifles at several Drones.

"you having fun there, Arby?" Kat asked.

"I hate that nickname, you know that?" Thel growled.

"that's why we call you it." John said coldly, ripping the door to the barracks off and charging in, his battle rifle blazing.

"always to the point." Richard sighed, firing his rifle. After clearing the barracks of the Brutes and saving seven Marines,

"alright, let's get up top to the deck. Get you outta here." Carter ordered. As they waited for the cargo lift to come down,

"General? We lost the Op center, Brutes disarmed the bomb. We're heading back to the Hanger, but I wouldn't wait for us." MacTavish said.

"Hocus, hold position. I'm not leaving my men." Shepherd ordered. As the SPARTAN's and Marines took the lift up to the deck,

"I got Jump Back Brutes going to the thrusters!" Hocus yelled.

"shake 'em off!" Shepherd yelled, leaving the Pelican to join the fight.

"are you crazy, General?"  
>"nope!" he yelled, firing his rifle at a Brute. Waves after waves of Brutes came down, but SPARTAN's and Marines killed them all.<p>

"General, get back on the Pelican! Where's the 141?" John asked.

"down there, getting chased by Drones." Shepherd said calmly.

"I FUCKING HATE DRONES!" Dempsey and Richtofen screamed.

"I'M ALL OUT OF VODKA! What does the clicking noise mean?" Nikolai asked, downing his vodka while trying to fire his Ppsh-41 SMG at the drones.

"it means your out of ammo!" Brown yelled, firing his MP5K.

"that's not good."

"of course it ain't good, keep shooting!" McNamara yelled, firing his W1200 shotgun at the Drones. After the Drones were dead, he quickly reloaded his pump-gun and ran up the stairs, catching up with his squad-mates.

"Carter, take Noble and get outta here. Your in charge of the 141 until I come back."

"Chief-" Carter began.

"I'm not gonna argue with you, Commander. I'll finish this by myself." John ordered.

"alright. Good luck, Chief."

"likewise, Commander. Now get outta here." John ordered. After the Pelicans left, John reloading his rifle, hopped the rail and sprinted to the CIC, killing all the Grunts and Jackals he encountered. When he got to the CIC,

"we have taken their command center!" a Brute captain declared.

"have you discovered how they plan to stop me?" Truth asked.

"not yet, holy Prophet." the Brute answered nervously.

"find out what I need to know, or your place on the Great Path is forfeit. Tell me you understand!"

"yes, Holy One. It shall be done. Have the Drones scour these machines! Find out what these _heathens_ know about the Ark!" the Brute barked. John broke silence and began killing them all. Once he rearmed the bomb,

"okay, the bomb is armed. We got your exit, Chief, a service elevator in the hanger. Get down there, cut through the caves!" MacTavish ordered. John sprinted his way through the caves and corridors, reaching the hanger. Unfortunately, even with his greater reflexes and abilities, he underestimated his speed. He would've ran through the railing and crashed to the deck, but he was fast enough to activate his jetpack and fly down to the service elevator. After killing the two grunts guarding it, he hit the switch and aimed his rifle at the door, which didn't close all the way. As the elevator began to descend, he felt something explode. The elevator shook violently as it picked up speed and crashed, causing the soldier to black out.

1 hour, 35 minutes later…

"god, my head hurts. What the hell happened?" John asked himself. He slowly got up and removed his helmet, holding his sore head. He reached to go grab a cigarette, only to find out he was empty.

"dammit. How's my… fuck, no vodka either." John grumbled. The three things to keep him calm were gone: Cortana, cigarettes, and vodka. Putting his anger aside, he ordered the Marines in the burning parking garage over to the one next door. Inside were two Warthogs parked and ready for action.

"open that door, let's get the hell outta here." John ordered, taking the wheel of the chain-gun 'Hog. The Marines, now excited to have a SPARTAN with them, quickly opened the large door and hopped in the war machines. After roaring through the crumbling caves and passing several stranded Marines,

"Covenant Lance straight ahead! Conserve your ammo, don't shoot unless you have to!" John ordered.

"yeah, let's get 'em!" a Marine yelled. After killing the Lance, they spotted the remains of the New Mombassa Space Elevator.

"damn. What happened here?" John asked.

"the elevator collapsed from that slipspace rupture, weakened the support rings." the gunner replied.

"wasn't the elevator thousands of kilometers high?" the female Marine riding shotgun asked.  
>"well, now's it's scattered all across the goddamn Savannah!" the Marine yelled back.<p>

"enough chit-chat, let's go." John said, turning the Warthog around.

"Chief? Still can't get the general. Comms are a mess, Pelicans are scattered to hell. Best thing now? Get some distance between us and the base. Brutes are gonna be looking for survivors." Sgt. Reynolds said over the comm. After driving past another crashed Phantom and killing all the Covenant there, they continued roaring across the desert. They reached an abandoned way station filled with Covenant and Human troops duking it out. Stacker was busy calling for help.

"my convoy's been hit. I've got wounded… we're on the Tsavo Highway about….. east of Voi. Someone, anyone, please, respond!" the Warthogs followed a Brute Chopper and shot it to pieces. After killing all the Covenant, some of which were simply ran over,

"we were on route to Voi, but Banshees came outta nowhere and began strafing our position. Pretty much ruined our day. My boys up ahead really need these supplies, but I'm sure they'll be happy to see you as well."

"hop on." John said, pushing his dead gunner off. He had his head blown off by a Jackal Carbine Rifle. After destroying the barrier and the holo-panel Truth was using to preach to his troops, the Hogs roared through a heavily damaged tunnel and dropped into a damaged Highway. A Covenant CCS-Battlecruiser then jumped over them. It didn't notice them, however. If it did, it didn't care.

"General? This is ONI recon-111. The cruisers above… they found…."

"say again, Recon, you're breaking up."

"there's something in the crater, sir. Something beneath the storm."

The Warthogs reached a gap in the bridge.

"alright, ditch the Hogs' we'll go on foot." John ordered. Running to support the Marines up ahead,

"holy crap, we got a SPARTAN with us!" several of the Marines yelled. Jumping in the air, he landed on a deployable tower and slapped one of Makarov's grenades on it. Jumping off, the tower exploded quite violently, vaporizing the Jackals onboard.

"damn Russian's a fucking pyromaniac." John swore. A Wraith spotted him and fired a plasma mortar at the lone SPARTAN. John ran forward and jumped on the tank, slamming another grenade deep inside. Jumping off, the tank suffered another, fiery demise.

"wow, he just charged a tank and lived!" a Marine cried out.

"Phantom, inbound! Hold that position, Chief, we'll send reinforcements to you, ASAP!" Shepherd ordered. After killing all the Brutes the Phantom dropped off,

"Chief, this is General Shepherd. We managed to scrounge up several attack gunships, but this is strictly a ground operation. Take these warthogs and get to Voi. We'll provide whatever support we can, but it's all up to you. Miranda's busy landing troops at the outskirts of Voi, so she can't help us at the moment. Jacob Keyes is busy contending with that Supercarrier up in orbit, so he's outta luck. We're counting on you, Chief."

"if I do this, do I get more cigs and vodka?" John asked.

"all you want."

"alright, I'll get it done." John said. The Warthogs and modified Hornet gunships took off toward Voi. After destroying all the opposition, including several Shade Turrets, Choppers, and Wraiths, they smashed through the blockade and killed off all the Covenant at the door. Two Pelicans arrived, dropping off another Warthog and several Marines. Inside the lead Pelican,

"Admiral Hood, we made it." Shepherd reported.

"music to my ears, General. What about the Ark?" Hood asked.

"fully uncovered sir. I'm issuing a tactical bombing of the structure."

"negative, we stick to the plan, general. Marines, the Prophet doesn't know it yet, but he's about to get kicked off his throne. We will take our city back, and drive the enemy into the grave they've been so happily digging. One last effort is all that remains." Hood said from his command ship.

"alright. All Pelican and Hornet gunships, your orders are to now provide whatever close air-support to the ground forces. Do not let them fail. Hocus, bring in the Task Force." Shepherd ordered. More Pelicans arrived and dropped off the 141.

"ready to make some noise, Chief?" Veronica asked.

"yeah. Make some noise people, and watch your back. And don't trust those gunships. I almost got pasted by one." John said, pulling a bent .50 cal round off his shoulder.

November 17th, 2552

Voi, near Unidentified Alien Artifact [The Portal], Kenya, East Africa, Earth

A large convoy of Warthogs roared through a tunnel on Tsavo Highway. Several heavily armed Hornet gunships flew over them to provide close air-support. Over the comm,

"Master Chief, this is Captain Keyes, I've taken over for General Shepherd concerning this mission. As you probably already now, Truth has found the Ark, so our only chance at stopping that bastard is a surprise aerial assault. We'll catch him with his pants down; clear this entire sector of all AA weaponry, make a hole for our ships. I'm sorry that I couldn't send in more troops, my forces are stretched beyond thin right now. For the time being, you're on your own. Good hunting, and good luck."

The convoy stopped in front of a large door that led inside a TRAXUS INC building.

"Chief, open the door. We'll follow you in, hit 'em with the .50's." Stacker ordered.

"I want all our air support close by, we'll deploy markers for you to hit." John ordered, hoping these new pilots had better aim. Seeing no enemies, he opened the main door and motioned for the Warthogs to follow. The door opened up and revealed several Grunts and Jackals.

"smoke 'em." John said calmly.

"demon, run away!" a frightened Grunt cried out. After they killed off the last of the Grunts, they drove down the hallway where they encountered several Grunts, some Brutes and two Ghosts. Suddenly, the mentioned enemies were turned into mush from high-velocity .50 cal armor-piercing shells. And it came from above.

"damn pilots get too fucking cocky, think they can just shoot everything they see." Dempsey muttered.

"wait. There's only one pilot I know who'd pull this off. Ramius, was that you who shot up the tunnel?" John asked as he wheeled the Warthog outside. Up head was a Boeing AH-64 Apache gunship that was well past the definition of 'overly-armed'.

"how'd you know it was me?" the Russian pilot asked.

"you have a very distinct flying style that no one else can copy, knew it was you from the start."

"you got an AA Wraith in the lakebed, want me to destroy it?" Nikolai asked. He flew by and fired a large amount of missiles that destroyed the Covenant opposition.

"I'd appreciate that."

"come about. Stand by." Ramius muttered. His Apache turned around and fired off two HE rockets that destroyed the enemy vehicle.

"got another Wraith at the door. I'll take care of it." more rockets flew and the Wraith was history.

"you're clear. Call me if you need backup." Nikolai said, firing his multiple chain-guns into the building, hoping to kill some Covenant. Inside the building,

"they just keep coming!" a Marine yelled, frantically firing his MA5C.

"check your fire, it's the Chief! Flush 'em out sir, we'll nail 'em with the fifty!" the female sergeant cried out.

"Nikolai, I need heavy fire suppression right behind this door. Planting the marker now." Kat ordered.

"hold on to your hats." the Russian replied. The ground literally shook as rockets and missiles slammed into the Covenant forces, decorating the walls with scorch marks and blood. After the Drones suffered a similar fate,

"push to the next lakebed!" John yelled, hopping in his Warthog and gunning it.

_I have defied Gods and Demons_….. Another Cortana moment interrupted John. _That Gravemind better keep his slimy tentacles off her_ John thought angrily.

"we got more AA Wraiths in the next lake bed, I'm gonna take 'em out." Nikolai declared, flying around. It was a safe bet to say that Nikolai effectively destroyed the whole lakebed, but his luck couldn't last forever.

"damn, that last one almost got me. They're aim is getting better. That, or I'm getting slower." he muttered.

"alright lake bed secured. I'm sending in more troops, Chief. Hold that position until you get new orders." MacTavish ordered.

"well that's a dumb order, shouldn't we keep up the attack?" Emile asked.

"Nikolai, you spot any more AA weaponry?" Carter asked.

"yeah, I see a Mantis blocking the path."

"go soften 'em up for us!" Price yelled, reloading his rifle.

"right, I'll go see what I can do." the Apache left, leaving the Marines with no air cover.

"wait a minute, something big is closing in on your location. Scarab, find some cover, now!" MacTavish ordered.

"this never gets any easier, does it?" Johnson asked, manning a missile pod. To make matters worse, Banshees started flying down, so the Marines now had to contend with the Scarab, some Ghosts and now Banshees.

"Dutch, you bring your Laser?" Jun yelled.

"yeah, so?"

"USE IT!" Jun and several Marines screamed.

"alright, forgot I had the damn thing with me." Dutch said rather embarrassed.

"don't worry, we won't tell anyone." Dare said, trying to stifle her laughter.

"it's a good bet that everyone already knows!" Dempsey yelled, firing his BAR.

"boy, it sure would be nice if we had some _air support_ right now, wouldn't it?" John-117 hollered at Price.

"alright, my mistake!" Price hollered back.

"Makarov, Price, you're with me! We're taking that Scarab!" Richard yelled.

"not yet, destroy the leg joints! Bring it down to the ground!" Carter yelled. Two Longswords flew overhead, dropping much needed ordinance on the Scarab.

"well, looks like we don't have to board any Scarab now." Romeo sighed, viewing the destroyed war machine.

"Nikolai, what's the status on the Mantis?" Price called out.

"…..they're getting better….can't….dammit….I can't destroy this thing!" was all that was heard from Nikolai's chopper.

"looks like he was shot down. Up to us now." John sighed. The Task Force 141 ran through the TRAXUS factory, encountering several wounded Marines. After ignoring another Cortana moment,

"Kat, get on the horn, I wanna know what's happening to that alien machine out there." John ordered. On the radio,

"all Brute cruisers are pulling back to Truth's ship. Winds inside the storm just hit 200 kilometers per hour. Energy cascades all over the artifact!" another transmission then broke through.

"Admiral, a single Covenant ship has slipped in-system!" Miranda reported.

"just one, what's it's range and disposition?" Hood asked.

"above the artifact, inside the orbital line. Seems to be holding steady."

"the attack proceeds as planned, Commander. We're not gonna get another shot at Truth."

John's heart momentarily skipped a beat. He knew what was on that ship, but he was hoping, so desperately hoping that he was wrong.

"alright, let's move. We can't stay here. And send a message out, someone needs to go pick up Ramius. Polonsky, take point." John ordered. The American veteran slapped his bayonet on his rifle.

"alright, time to kill." he muttered. He ran forward, firing his rifle at the Brutes.

"get on top of the bridge, we'll have better fire superiority from there!" John ordered. After the Brutes were killed,

"glad you SPARTAN's are here. Thought they had us for sure." a Marine sergeant sighed.

"right. Alright, you're with us. We got civilians coming out, watch your fire!" Carter yelled.

"that means don't shoot them, Chernov." Reznov warned.

"no shit." Chernov replied.

"stay dead this time!" Nikolai yelled, tossing a grenade toward the Brutes. Unfortunately, two civvies were caught in the blast.

"what, he never said no shoot civilians to me." Chernov said. Reznov just rolled his eyes.

"help us!" one of the constructor workers yelled, firing his M6 magnum.

"never send civvies to do a SPARTAN's job." Kat snarled, firing her MA37.

"wow, SPARTAN's. I can't believe you guys are here." a worker said in awe.

"I can't believe your still alive, these Brutes shoulda killed you." John said coldly. After clearing the factory of all Brutes, they ran to the last door to find two Hunters toasting several workers.

"Dutch, laser 'em." Buck ordered.

"SAY HELLO TO VERA!" Dutch hoarsely yelled, killing the two alien monsters. The Task Force 141, the Marines and workers ran outside, where they were greeted by a Brute Chieftain and his pack. They were listening to a sermon by Truth when they were interrupted.

"I have a little present for you!" Makarov yelled, pulling out a rather large satchel sack and tossing it in the middle. The explosion was very large, creating a massive crater in the road. The Brutes and Grunts, including the Chieftain, were no longer there. More then likely they were vaporized.

"there's a reason I made you guys my premier explosive experts." John commented.

"so you like what I bring to the table?" Makarov said with a smirk.

"as long as it doesn't harm any UNSC personal, I don't care. Now lets' destroy that gun." John ordered. Rounding the corner they found Nikolai flying his Apache around, trying to distract the gun. It didn't work, even though he was firing his rockets at it.

"Chief, this is MacTavish, I'm coming down now with additional marines, copy?" Soap asked. John didn't pay any attention to his transmission.

"alright, we're taking that hill and destroying that gun!" John ordered. The 141 ran up the hill, firing their weapons despite the blistering enemy fire they received. The Covenant were rather surprised by what they saw. When they killed all the defenders,

"area secure!" Emile yelled.

"perfect, destroy this gun! I want charges on the rear leg, we'll knock it down and send it into the lakebed!" MacTavish yelled, now joining the fight.

"or we could just shoot the plasma container!" Dare yelled, firing her M7 suppressed at a large white hot ball of plasma that dropped from the gun's belly. The sustained fire of the entire task force of humans was more than enough to destroy AA gun. The plasma overloaded and destroyed the turret, sending it into the lakebed bellow.

"Admiral Hood, the guns are destroyed, you can begin your assault." Kat reported over the comms. 5 UNSC frigates, two badly damaged UNSC Halcyons, 1 UNSC Marathon cruiser, and the UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun roared overhead, with hundreds of Longsword fighters racing ahead of them. The Dreadnaught was ablaze as thousands of AA missiles slammed into the superstructure.

"all ships, fire at will!" Hood ordered. Dozens of MAC rounds slammed into the Dreadnaught with the hopes that it would be enough to kill Truth. The Forerunner warships simply shrugged off the rounds. Something strange then began to happen. The alien artifact began to glow as it opened up, revealing a large, starfish like shape. Truth's ship was slowly lowered into the Artifact as a brilliant blue bolt of light shot out from the center and gathered in the sky.

"is that what the Covenant were digging up?" Buck asked, very surprised.

"yeah. That's what they were digging up." MacTavish said rather grimly. The bolt began to grow thicker and thicker until it burst, sending out a shockwave that momentarily knocked everyone out. When they came to, they found a massive glowing blue sphere in the sky above with a dark center. Adm. Hood's fleet was drifting in the air, disorganized from the shockwave.

"what did Truth just do? Did he activate the rings?" Captain Keyes asked.

"doesn't matter. Evac all wounded and regroup. Whoever Truth went, that's where we-" Hood began.

"sir, new contact slipping in!" a naval officer reported. Despite hoping, John knew all too well what the new contact was. A badly damaged CCS-class Battlecruiser exited slipspace and roared overhead, emanating an odd green smoke from it's vents. The members of the 141 who followed Regret to Installation 05 knew what was onboard. They stiffened up as they reloaded their weapons and made sure they had enough grenades with them.

"what is it? More brutes?" Veronica asked.

"worse." John said coldly.

"what could be more worse than Brutes?" Romeo asked.

"you'll find out. You'll find out soon enough." John said with a very cold chuckle.

November 17th, 2552

Voi, East Africa Protectorate, East Africa, Earth

"Admiral, the Floods spreading all over the city. The situation has just gone from bad to worse." Captain Keyes warned.

"I'm all ears for suggestions."

"find the crashed Flood ship and overload the engine cores. It'll destroy the city, but that's nothing compared to losing all of Earth."

"do whatever you can, Captain."

"Chief, I need you to find the crash site and destroy that ship. You have my authorization to use whatever means necessary. Ramius, go with them. Provide whatever air support you can."

"I'll do what I can, Captain."

"alright, shoot to kill. As of this moment, everyone's hostile. You see something suspicious, shoot it. If it makes a noise, shoot it again. Don't take any chances. Kill first, ask questions later." John said. Now the majority of the 141 was now acting more different, more on the edge. It made Captain Dare and her team wonder what was on that ship; what caused it to make everyone else so on edge. And to make matters worse, an odd fog had now settled in, making everyone more nervous. As they headed back into town,

"sir, unknown contacts up on high!" "we're surrounded sergeant!" were only the few radio contacts they heard. They encountered the ramp that led into the factory where they witnessed dozens of Flood Infection Forms and Flood Combat Forms jump down on them.

"kill 'em all!" John yelled. The gunfire was rather blistering, not many survived it. One of the sergeants got infected. Lev proceeded to shoot him up.

"what are you doing, that's the sergeant!" Dare yelled.

"THAT WAS THE SERGEANT!" the Russian hollered back, reloading his M240.

"alright, everyone get inside. Dare, you're taking point. Don't hesitate to shoot." John ordered, reloading his rifle. They headed inside where Veronica got the surprise of her life.

"GET IT OFF ME, GET IT OFF ME!" a helpless Marine cried out as several Infection Forms landed on him. Right before her eyes, the Marine was transformed alive into a Flood Combat Form. Instinctively, she pulled the trigger, killing the form. But it was obvious she was traumatized by what she saw. She and everyone else that stayed behind were forever traumatized by the actions of the Flood as the Marines inside the factory became infected. The rest of the 141 killed them all with no hesitation at all.

"you wanna keep fighting at stay alive, or do you wanna stay here and end up like them? Your choice." John snarled, leaving the cargo area. The ODST's snapped out of their stupor and ran after everyone else.

"TASTE RUSSIAN HOSPITALITY!" Nikolai screamed, firing his newly acquired M90 shotgun into a Flood Pure Form, blasting a massive hole in it's chest.

"use your Molotov's, burn the scum off the face of the Earth!" Reznov yelled, tossing a fire bomb. The Flood quickly burnt to a crisp.

"burn, you little freak bags, burn!" Dempsey yelled, firing his BAR. As the trigger-happy squad continued through the factory, they saw several Marines get overwhelmed by the Flood.

"someone grab the flamethrower, we're gonna need it! Nikolai, pound everything north of us with everything you got!" John ordered. The Flood forms ahead of the task force were almost instantly shredded and vaporized by the Apache gunship.

"Nikolai, hold your fire! We're moving forward!" Price yelled, reloading his rifle. Ignoring another Cortana moment, John led the task force back to the same aid station they came across earlier. There was an extremely traumatized marine whimpering in the corner.

"I...I didn't have a choice! The Lt...the sergeant...they were all infected! I could see it crawling...sliding around beneath their skin! And, and then they got up...they s-started to talk! Oh my god! Their voices! Oh, God! No, make them stop! I did them a favor...y-yeah that's it; I helped them! Maybe...maybe I need to help myself." he found himself riddled by armor-piercing 7.62 NATO rounds.

"why'd you do that?" Mickey yelled.

"in his condition, he's better off dead." Kat said coldly. They headed outside where they saw three separatists CCS-class battle cruisers along with the assault carrier _Shadow of Intent_ fly overhead, dropping Elites to help combat the Flood.

"let's keep moving. Nikolai, we got Flood ahead of us, burn 'em up." Mason ordered.

"stand by." the Russian pilot said. The gunship let loose a obliterating barrage of missiles, rockets, .50 cal rounds and large 20mm rounds that destroyed the Flood. After they were cleared,

"Nikolai, they're gonna be Flood in that building, I know it. Shred 'em up." John ordered.

"can't do it, my sensors are down. You're gonna have to clear it out."

"bullocks, he just wants to save his ammo. Alright, let's keep moving." Price muttered. Clearing the building out was more challenging then they thought, even with the help of the Elites.

"stay dead, freak sack!" Dempsey yelled, bashing in the head of a Brute Combat Form.

"they're all over the place!" Buck yelled.

"just keep shooting; don't let up!" John yelled. After the main hallway was cleared, they found themselves at the crash site.

"Chief, the Elites are looking for something. We didn't believe them when they told us." Captain Keyes cut in.

"what is it?" John snarled, tossing a Plasma Grenade at a Pure Form.

"it's Cortana, Master Chief. They think she's in that ship. Board it, search for her, and if she's there, bring her out." Keyes said, stunning everyone. Everyone except John, that is.

"Nikolai, bomb that crash site with everything you got, but be selective! When you're run outta ammo, start throwing rocks!" Carter ordered.

"roger that, commander." Nikolai then cut the comm off and proceeded to hit the crash site with a blistering barrage of missiles and guns.

"Captain Dare, we're holding this position! Nothing gets in or out!" Woods yelled, firing his Commando.

"Kennedy, you got your HE's?" Jun yelled, sniping a Ranged Form.

"always carry 'em!" he yelled, firing his China Lake. After shooting their way to the crash site,

"Nikolai, hold your fire, we're at the site!" Roach yelled out.

"I'm at bingo fuel, I'm gonna have to RTB to refuel and restock."

"thanks a lot for the support, couldn't have done it without you." Carter said, reloading his DMR.

"alright, hold this position. Don't let anything through. I'm going in there." John ordered.

"what, alone? Are you crazy?" Romeo asked.

"don't let anyone, or anything for that matter, get through. I'll be back." John ordered, hopping in the wreckage. _Why the hell'd she stay back on High Charity, she should've know what would've happened. _John thought to himself as he explored the wreckage. Remembering back to last time, which seemed more like a distant memory then actual fact, he knew exactly where to go. And who he would expect. That's when the Gravemind Moments began. _do not be afraid. I am peace, I am salvation. I am a timeless chorus. Join your voice with mine, and sing victory everlasting._ John blocked the creepy voice out of his head and continued toward his destination. Hopping up to the console, he activated a small device.

"Chief! High Charity, the Covenants holy city is on its way to-" the recording cut short. John looked to his right and saw a familiar face he never thought he'd see again, at least not for a while.

"ah, Reclaimer!" 343 Guilty Spark said surprised.

"what are you doing here?" John asked coldly. After blasting a Combat Form, the Monitor then latched onto the device with a laser beam from his eye.

"leave her alone." John growled, wrenching the Monitor from the Covenant device. He'd much prefer have Doc Brown take a look; he could trust Brown with his life. He couldn't trust Guilty Spark as far as he could kick him.

"I must act quickly before your construct suffers any more damage!"

"leave her alone." John growled.

"if we do not take this device to some place safe, someplace I can make repairs-"

"no fucking way. Back on Halo, you tried to kill Cortana. You even tried to kill me."

"protocol dictated my response! She stole the Activation Index, and you were going to destroy my Installation! You did destroy my Installation. Now, I have only one purpose: to help you, Reclaimer. As I always should've done." he said.

"no funny business." John warned, handing the storage device over to the Monitor. The Separatist Phantom pulled them up and away from the wreckage as two CCS warships glassed the wreckage to prevent the Flood from spreading. The Phantom flew over to the Shadow of Intent, which was 'parked' next to the much larger Supercarrier Rise of the Morning Sun. Inside the bridge of the assault carrier, the Task Force 141 stood on one side, while Sangheili warriors stood across from them. Shipmaster Rtas 'Vadum sat in his chair on the far end of the table, while Admiral Hood, Captain Keyes, and Commander Keyes stood on the end. Jacob was busy smoking his pipe, along with every other smoker in the 141, even John-117. He didn't care what Hood thought of him smoking.

"will it live, Oracle? Can it be saved?" Rtas asked. Guilty Spark was busy trying to repair the unit.

"uncertain. This storage device has suffered considerable trauma. It's matrices are… highly unstable."

"perhaps if I took a look at that." Brown began.

"that will not be necessary." Rtas said rather sternly. The device then light up.

"success!" Guilty Spark said happily.

"bastard." Brown grumbled.

"Chief! High Charity, the Prophet's Holy City, is on it's way to Earth. With an army of Flood. I can't tell you everything. It's not safe, the Gravemind, it knows I'm in the system." the image froze.

"it's only a message." John said.

"let it play." Rtas said.

"what the hell's a Gravemind?" Dutch asked.

"I don't know." Weaver replied.

"but it doesn't know about the Portal, where it leads. On the other side, there's a solution. A way to stop the Flood, without firing the remaining Halo rings. Ah! Hurry chief… the Ark.. There isn't much time." the image then froze.

"I'm… sorry." Spark said apologetically.

"no matter, Oracle. We've heard enough. Our fight is through the Portal, with the Brutes and with the bastard Truth!" Rtas bellowed.

"fine, we'll remain here. Hold out as long as we can." Hood resigned.

"did you not hear? Your world is doomed. A flood army, a Gravemind itself, has you in its sights! You barely survived one contamination!" Rtas said, climbing off his chair.

"and you, shipmaster, burned half a fucking continent! Maybe the Flood isn't all we should be worried about!" Captain Keyes snapped.

"one single Flood spore can infect an entire species! If it wasn't for the Arbiter's counsel, I would've glassed your entire planet!" Rtas growled. Hood was about to retort on that, but Miranda stopped him.

"sir, with all due respect, Cortana does have a solution."

"Cortana? Did you see how damaged she is? She could be corrupted for all we know! Her solution could be a Flood trap!"

"we should go through the Portal, find out for sure."

"what we should do commander is understand-clearly-that this is our last stand. Here. At Earth. If we go, we risk everything. Down to the last man, woman and child. We hold our ground here, we might have a chance." Hood said.

"no. If Cortana is wrong, if her solution is indeed a trap, then the Flood has already won." Shepherd said, putting out his cigar.

"I'll find Cortana's solution, and I'll bring it back." John said determined.

"Earth. It's all we have left. You trust Cortana that much?" Hood asked.

"yes sir." John said a little angrily.

"this is either the best decision you made or the worst. Hell if it is, Chief? I honestly doubt I'll find out which one it is."

"I'm taking the SPARTAN's with me. And the Morning Sun, along with the In Amber Clad. That's all I'll need." Captain Keyes said. The tone in his voice and his eyes said that his decision was final. Hood left the room, as did several Elites.

"alright, it's settled then. Carter, I want those Hueys brought out of shelter, we're gonna need them, badly. Stock 'em up on as much guns and missiles they can carry. Scrounge up as much weapons and ammo as you can. We're gonna need it." John ordered. The 141, Captain and Commander Keyes left the room and began arming themselves up. In the main hanger bay of the Intent, a large commotion of Elites and humans were busy getting everything ready for the mission. Scorpions, Warthogs, Mongoose ATV's, Wraiths, and Ghosts were roaring all over the place, getting into their proper positions. The 141's Huey choppers flew overhead through the massive airlock to the Morning Sun as Phantom gunships flew beneath them flying the opposite direction. The 141 were busy chatting.

"that was some crazy shit down there. I'm not gonna forget that anytime soon. As if I wanted to forget all that." Romeo said.

"you guys fought that this Flood, how is it that you're not mentally traumatized by that?" Veronica asked.

"who's to say we aren't?" Carter asked, giving the impression that he too, along with the rest of the 141 were mentally scarred.

"hey, check it out." Nixon pointed with his M-16. John-117 was busy carrying a large white tube on one shoulder towards the airlock. Written on the side in red coloring were the words 'Nova 6.'

"you've got to be kidding me. He's gonna use that?" Richtofen said.

"that man's crazy. Think we should talk to Lord Hood about him?" Jorge asked.

"we're all in agreement on this, no matter what the consequences?" Carter looked everyone in the eye. Everyone agreed.

"alright, let's find him. Just one thing, what the hell are we gonna say to him?" Carter asked.

"I got something in mind." Castro said, slinging his AK-47 over his shoulder. About 3 hours later, a single Pelican dropship left the assault carrier back towards Earth carrying a single admiral. The Separatist Fleet along with the UNSC In Amber Clad and the UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun flew into the Portal to continue the fight.

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><p><strong>Read and review, next chapter should be coming up soon!<strong>


	11. Chapter 10

**Disclaimer: I don't own a lot of things. Enjoy my newest chapter!**

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><p>Chapter 10<p>

December 11th, 2552

Unidentified Alien Construct [Installation 00 {The Ark}]

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

UNSC In Amber Clad

The Separatist fleet exited slipspace over the massive alien construct that was so similar to the Halo rings. A large fleet of Loyalist starships was on approaching them at high speeds. In the Shadow of Intent,

"Brute ships! Staggered line! Shipmaster, they outnumber us, 3-to-1!"

"then it is an even fight. All warships, fire at will! Burn their mongrel hides!" Rtas ordered. The only UNSC warships joining the fleet had already opened fire with their deadly MAC cannons. In the Morning Sun,

"Truth's ship isn't taking part in the battle. Looks like he went to the surface. Shepherd, you're in charge of our Marine force." Captain Keyes ordered.

"roger that, captain. We're already on his tail. Hocus, kick the door open." Shepherd said, climbing in the pilot's seat of Kilo 023. Several Pelicans dropped away from the Supercarrier and roared down toward construct's surface, amidst the dogfights of Loyalists and Separatist Banshees and UNSC Longswords. As they continued downward,

"we good Hocus?" Shepherd asked.

"she's a little cooked, General. But she'll hold."

"alright then, open the rear hatch. Confirm the rest of the dropships to do the same. We'll drop half of the 141 here, the rest will go to the drop site alpha-bravo. We're dropping off the SPARTAN's and ODST's here. Get ready." Shepherd ordered. The Pelican landed and the aforementioned troops ran off.

"we'll call when we need any more support. Other than that, stick with the mission." Carter ordered.

"I got that, Commander. Get up that hill and go kill something." Shepherd replied.

"okay up the hill, move." John ordered. As they ran up the dirt,

"hey, look at the sky man. Is that-" Joseph began.

"keep your eyes focused on the mission, not whatever's out there." John ordered. They rendezvoused with another squad of ODST's and found themselves overlooking a large Covenant platoon viewing a sermon from Truth.

"okay, snipers get ready. Pop the leaders, put 'em in a state of panic. We'll clear out the rest. Mickey, rocket that tower." John ordered. Mickey quietly brought up his M41 'Jackhammer' rocket launcher.

"ready." he whispered.

"light 'em up." John ordered. Sniper rifle and rocket fire rained down on the group of soldiers. Several of the Brute leaders now found themselves with massive holes in their heads, while others found burning shreds of their tower falling down on them.

"now!" John yelled, running forward. The SPARTAN's and ODST's ran forward, firing their weapons and killing all the Grunts, Jackals, and Brutes that were left alive.

"get down here, we're going up this hill and through the cave!" Dare yelled. Jun, Romeo, and Mickey dropped down and caught up with their squad mates. They ran up the stone hill, firing into the grunts they saw.

"okay, through the cave. Whatever's on the other side, you kill it. Dutch, you're taking point." John ordered. No words were said as they quietly huddled through the rock. They found some bad news on the other side, however.

"they're building an AA battery. That thing'll tear the Dawn to shreds." Dutch whispered.

"alright. Jun, Romeo, you two stay behind and spot 'em for us. Carter, Kat, Jorge, Emile, you four will assault the left flank, use the rocks to your advantage. Veronica, Edward, Dutch, Mickey, you're taking the right. Richard and Joseph will go with me down the middle. Jun, go back and tell those other ODST's they're strictly for reserve, they're not to come down unless I give the order. Alright, let's move." John ordered. After everyone got in position,

"now!" John yelled, tossing a frag grenade. Everyone jumped out and assaulted the Covenant position. The aliens didn't know what hit them. A Phantom arrived and dropped off two Hunters, which the SPARTAN's easily killed.

"alright, let's move." Carter sighed. The soldiers ran through the rock and found themselves some sort of Forerunner bunker. Over the comm,

"Chief, I'm giving the Brutes all I got. But this is a heavy-weight fight. The Dawn's only got tonnage to last a couple of rounds. Find me a place I can set her down, over!" Commander Keyes rang out.

"let's find that LZ." John said, slapping a fresh mag in his rifle. They left the facility and found themselves on top of a small, curving hill that led down into a rather large, sandy opening. A Longsword that was burning roared overhead. There were several Marines huddled on the top.

"Flak got our Pelican, sir. But before we went down we spotted a rather good LZ. If we can get to our vehicles, we'll lead you to it." Pvt. Dubbo said.

"alright, let's take 'em." John ordered. A massive wall of hot lead rained down on the Covenant and slammed into Brutes and Grunts.

"alright, find some cover. I have a feeling the Brutes are gonna come back with reinforcements." John ordered, manning the M41 chain-gun on the destroyed Warthog. Five Prowlers arrived, inadvertently giving the humans transports to the LZ. After killing the Brutes,

"alright, take the Mongooses and Prowlers. Stock up on as much ammo as you can, we're gonna need it." John ordered, taking the turret on a Prowler. The makeshift convoy turned around and roared towards the Covenant blockade through the canyon, shooting up their Ghosts and Choppers.

"should we check for survivors?" Dubbo asked concerning the Longsword.

"no point." Carter replied plainly. After commandeering the still-intact Warthog they found on the side,

"you see that giant wall up ahead? We're rendezvousing there!" John ordered, turning the turret on a fleeing Grunt. The Covenant had plenty of fortifications, however, so shooting their way to the wall proved harder then they originally thought. _I don't remember getting to the wall being this difficult. _John thought to himself.

"hey, does anyone hear that?" Carter asked.

"hear what, other than the sound of plasma rifles flying by?" Buck asked.

A small fleet of overly-armed Mil Mi-28 gunships flew overhead, firing rockets at the Covenant.

"Nikolai, get outta here. We can handle them. Get to the rest of the 141, they're gonna need your help." John ordered.

"Shepherd's orders. The rest of the 141 doesn't need my help."

"what are you talking about?" Veronica demanded.

"I just have my orders, ma'am, Shepherd won't say anything else."

"alright. Just be careful where you shoot, I don't wanna end up dead because you're too damn trigger happy." John sighed.

After clearing the bridge of all Covenant forces, a single Pelican flew overhead. MacTavish was piloting it.

"almost got my wing shot off. But I spotted a structure on the other side of this wall. From what we learned at the debriefings, it matches the description of a some map building from the first Halo ring." the Scottish major announced.

"a Cartographer. Good, should help secure Truth's position. Secure that LZ, we'll push through the wall." Shepherd replied.

"roger that, general. Follow my Pelican, Chief. LZ's this way."

The sentinels followed the humans.

"I sure hope they don't decide to clean us up." Carter muttered.

"do they even see us?" Veronica asked.

"oh, they see us alright. They're just wondering whether to paste us or not." John grumbled. Roaring down the canyon they found several Marines being held down by heavy Covenant weapons fire.

"glad to see you here, Chief!"

"alright, hold your position, we'll clear 'em out." John yelled. After the Covenant force was defeated,

"the LZ's through the cave sir. Watch yourself, got Covenant heavy armor."

"Ramius, go soften 'em up for us!" Carter yelled. The gunships utterly destroyed the armor and AA wraiths.

"okay, LZ's clear. You can bring her down, commander." Ramius reported.

"roger that, I'm beginning my descent."

"hey, is the Dawn even rated for atmo?" Dubbo asked.

"guess we'll find out." Kat replied. Nikolai's gunships quickly flew away so they wouldn't get smashed by the frigate. The frigate landed, sending dust and debris everywhere. The rear left then lowered, revealing several Scorpions and Warthogs. Shepherd and his fleet of Pelicans landed, dropping off the last of the Task Force.

"did the Elites get a fix on the Cartographer?" Miranda asked.

"yes ma'am. But it's surrounded by Brute heavy armor." MacTavish replied.

"don't worry, we got a plan. Instead of flying over it, we'll shoot our way through it. Mount up on the tanks, we're going hunting." Shepherd ordered.

"ooh-rah!" Dempsey yelled. Despite everything that was going on, John felt very at peace now that the 141 was together again.

"Ramius, take your squadron and provide air-support. And if we find any locked doors, the Spark will pry 'em open for us." Shepherd ordered.

"I'll certainly try my best. But I am a little unfamiliar with this facility." the Monitor said sheepishly.

"alright, let's move out." John ordered, grabbing a tank. The first wave of the Covenant counter-attack began through the cave. After the tanks destroyed the Ghosts,

"hey, how does 90mm of tungsten taste to you?" Johnson yelled. After shooting their way through more Ghosts, several Hunters, and even destroying a Phantom,

"alright, let's move. Nikolai, fly ahead and paste any Covenant you spot!" Price yelled, jamming down the triggers on the M247 on the tank. After grinding down the canyon leaving behind a trial of destruction, they found themselves at the wall, with Nikolai's choppers raining fire down on the Covenant.

"you know, a race like the Covenant would've surly thought of some gunships like we did." Dunn said lazily.

"I don't wanna hear that ever again, corporal. Because if they did create their own gunships, then we'd be in a world of hurt. I just wanna know how the hell did Nikolai slap so many rockets on his bird." John wondered. The tanks and 'Hogs clambered to the gate. John left his and climbed up to the door, waiting for Guilty Spark to open up.

"this way, Reclaimer." John walked inside the building, his eyes darting about. 30 years of fighting made him-and the rest of the 141-rather twitchy when it came to buildings. Especially John, seeing as he contended with Guilty Spark twice. After opening more doors, they found a panel that opened a bridge for the tanks to move across.

"this way, Reclaimer. We will meet your companions on the other side." as they left the building, they felt the ground quake as a Scarab began stomping down on them.

"Nikolai, go kill that Scarab, we'll take out these Wraiths!" Carter ordered. The gunships soared overhead, firing wave after wave of rockets at the walking war machine.

"okay, the flyboys are taking care of the Scarab, let's take care of that armor!" Dubbo yelled. The Scorpions opened fire on the Ghosts and Wraiths, destroying them all in a selective manner. After the Scarab blew to pieces,

"we got enemy infantry on the spire, taking them down." Nikolai commented, tearing the soldiers to shreds with his chin-mounted 50mm chain gun.

"not bad, humans. I saw that explosion for orbit. Truth's fleet lies in ruins. Find where the liar hides, so I may place my boot between his gums." Rtas declared. On top of the spire, a single Pelican landed, dropping off five more Marines and the Arbiter.

"alright, it's gonna be close quarters from now on. If you got a sniper rifle, switch it out for something else. Watch your corners and your backs. And be selective, there's no telling what's behind these doors." John ordered. After Guilty Spark opened the next door,

"sleeping grunts. The best kind, next to the dead kind." Kiril muttered, tossing in a large package. They sealed the door shut and a massive boom was heard. When they walked in, they found that the room was much, much, bigger, and more blacker as well. The Grunts were nowhere to be seen.

"alright. Let's keep moving. Makarov, you and your boys keep those satchels ready." John smirked. They entered the first level and shot their way through. For the next several levels, that's all they did: shoot their way through any opposition they found. Kill, and kill, and kill. When they got to the balcony, and expended half their ammunition in the process, Woods slapped his hand on the pad, although he was a bit unfamiliar with Forerunner tech. he'd seen John do it, so he figured it would work for him. The holoprojector lit up.

"is that our galaxy?" Kennedy asked.

"correct."

"so we're outside the rim, we outside our own galaxy." Reznov said in awe.

"two to the eighteenth light years from galactic center, to be precise."

"what is this place?" Carter asked as the holo-image changed.

"the Ark."

"this is the Ark?" Foley asked all surprised.

"I always assumed it would be part of a.. Shield installation. But it seems I was mistaken."

"that's a first." John said sarcastic.

"not at all. While I had a complete understanding of Installation 04, my makers wisely limited my knowledge of all other strategic facilities. Compartmentalization. In case I was ever captured by the Flood."

"the history's kinda boring me, so can you tell us where we are exactly?" Ghost asked, reloading his rifle.

"here."

"and the Prophet?"  
>"near one of the Ark's superluminal communication arrays, I'm afraid. Unfortunate, the meddler has triggered a barrier, a defensive perimeter around the Ark's core." he stopped talking for a moment when two Loyalist banshees flew over them.<p>

"the barrier will be difficult to disable. How odd that my makers would place such a comprehensive defense around a single-oh my!"

"what is it now?" Kat asked. A Loyalist Phantom then appeared and began firing on the task force.

"shit, get down!" John yelled.

"we have to get past that barrier, or the meddler will destroy it all!" Spark cried out.

"Nikolai, send some of your birds after that Phantom; he's got us pinned down!" MacTavish yelled. Four attack copters flew around and began to harass the enemy ship.

"alright, evac Pelicans are gonna meet us on the floor below, let's get down there! Move!" John yelled. The task force ran back into the building, killing any Brutes they saw.

"Nikolai, we got a whole mess of Brutes downstairs waiting for us! We're running low on ammo, so clean them up for us!" Mason yelled.

"I'll do what I can." the Russian pilot replied. As the group battled their way to the deck,

"the Pack will feast on you!" a Brute Chieftain yelled. Oddly enough, he ran away.

"coward." Thel muttered. The Chieftain suddenly found a Samurai sword in his back, courtesy of Takeo Masaki.

"nice throw. Don't Japanese have something about killing your enemy face to face, though?" Emile said impressed.

"after 3 decades of fighting, all I care about is finishing this war alive. So I'll do so any way possible." Takeo said, pulling his sword out and sheathing it. Out on the deck, Nikolai was busy slaughtering the Brutes and Jackals.

"you see, Mother Russia makes good airplanes!" the other Nikolai laughed as he downed his vodka.

"ETA damn quick, stand by for pickup!" Shepherd yelled. Several Pelicans quickly arrived, ready to pick up the 141. Before they boarded, a massive flock of Sentinels arrived.

"General!" John yelled.

"no, don't shoot! They mean us no harm! Those units have a priority task."

"and what's that?" Carter demanded.

"I really can't say… not for sure. But if you allow me to find a terminal closer to the core-"

"General, I'm gathering up the 4th Air Strike battalion, the 15th Air Bombardiers, and the 83rd Air Strike battalion. We're gonna go to that barrier and pound the Covenant until there's nothing left."

"negative, keep those gunships for back up. If they're more AA weaponry then we counted, we're gonna lose a lot of our attacking force. Spark, we're staying to the plan. Until we kill Truth, then nothing else matters." Shepherd ordered. The 141 boarded the Pelicans and followed the Sentinels to their destination.

December 11th, 2552

Unidentified Alien Construct [Installation 00]

A large task force of Pelicans and separatist Phantoms flew through the sky with a massive force of attack helicopters and Hornet gunships above and behind them, ready to destroy any enemy planes that were stupid enough to fly in their air space. Behind that was the reserve force, every flying war machine the separatists and humans could muster. Pelican's, Phantoms, Banshee's, Hornets, Seraphs, and Longswords ready to bomb Truth to oblivion. Behind them was the massive assault carrier Shadow of Intent, ready to provide additional support. And further behind that ship was the Supercarrier UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun, ready to deal the final blow should everything go south. Seeing as this was the final strike to kill the last of the Prophets, the Prophet of Truth, they weren't _any_ taking any chances.

"so we hit these three generators, and the barrier will fall?" Miranda asked.

"a small section. Yes." Spark said.

"well that's good enough. We can't risk to send all our troops in, incase the Covenant have something planned. Chief, take the Task Force 141 and to assault the far right tower. General Shepherd will take the 4th Regiment and take the left. The Arbiter and the Elites will go straight down the middle. We play our cards right, the war ends today." in the Pelicans carrying the 141,

"I'm seeing heavy triple-A all over the LZ." Hocus reported.

"put her down right there, lieutenant."

"sir?"  
>"get us on the ground. We'll take care of the rest." John ordered. Once the Pelicans landed,<p>

"okay people, this is it! We kill everything here and we do not stop until we bring the barrier down! War's almost over, just a little more is required!" John yelled. He only yelled that out just to keep his troops alive; he had no idea if the war was still going on. He distantly remembered at the very beginning that he basically has abandoned Earth when he met Dr. Brown at Ft. Ticonderoga. He never saw any action after that, at least not on Earth. He didn't know if there were still any Covenant left on Earth that needed cleaning. But what he yelled was enough to put enough stupor in his men and woman to destroy the small AA unit that consisted of two AA Wraiths and plenty of Shade turrets. After they fell,

"Commander, we're clear here. Some ground transport wouldn't go amiss." John said a little sarcastically. Several Warthogs were dropped.

"alright, up this hill! We kill whatever we see, understand?"

"well it's not like we do anything else except kill what we see." Ramirez said. John noticed a great amount of stress and fatigue in his voice; who could blame him? He was tired of fighting, they all were, including the Master Chief himself. It would be a safe guess to say every member was suffering from PTSD. He just hoped that it wasn't very extreme. Nevertheless, the Warthog convoy charged up the hill and blasted everything they saw. After driving over the waterfall, they encountered a Wraith and two Choppers.

"take care of those Choppers!" John hollered. After several minutes, the enemy vehicles were destroyed as Dempsey smashed through a shade turret.

"Chief, you need to offline that tower." the Commander ordered.

"working on it." John replied, gunning down a Jackal.

"area secure, let's get inside! Kill whatever you see!" Carter ordered. That was very easy considering the 141 was extremely trigger happy. After fighting through two Covenant-infested rooms,

"Makarov, you and your buddies are with me. Everyone else stay behind. Shred whatever comes through the outer doors." John ordered.

"that'll be easy." Carter said, slapping a bayonet on his rifle. Victor pressed his hand on the pad, causing the lift to go upwards.

"alright. I don't want to go overboard concerning the explosives. We need to bring the shield down, and we can't do that with the controls all shot up. You can use your M203's, but be extremely selective." John ordered. He knew that Makarov, Kiril, Lev, Anatoly and Victor were the best explosive experts he had on the squad. He also knew they were very careless when it came to blowing stuff up. The term pyromaniacs wouldn't begin to describe their technical prowess with anything that could go boom. But John noticed that they had shifted their tactics. At the very beginning of the war, they all used their explosives very carelessly; they mannerisms suggested that they had plenty of weapons onboard. Now near the wars end, they used explosives more directly, throwing massive satchel charges into massive squads of Covenant soldiers. They were running out of materials and equipment, just like everyone else was running out of supplies. With the supplies on the Morning Sun damn near empty, everyone had to be very wary about what they used in the field. That didn't stop Makarov and his team from blowing up whole battlefields, although John could count on that. The lift came to a halt and they encountered several Brutes. A Brute Chieftain wielding a Gravity Hammer roared a challenge. He was met by a HE Napalm grenade fired from Makarov's rifle.

"kill 'em all." John grumbled. Assault rifle, HMG, sniper rifle and shotgun fire filled the room as the hairy Brutes fell to the humans.

"bringing the shield down now." John sighed.

"Good work, SPARTAN. The first generator is down, the Arbiter and his Elites are bringing the second one down right now. It's all up to Shepherd and his men. General, what's your status?"

"we got Brute reinforcements! We're pinned down!"

"I'm sending help right now."

"negative! There's too many! Everyone pull back, right now! I'm not gonna lose any more men!" Shepherd argued.

"General? General? Chief, we lost contact. Get outside right now and get back to the beach, I'll be sending some transports your way." Captain Keyes ordered.

"alright, back downstairs." John ordered. The lift lowered and they found a large group of dead Grunts and Jackals near the entrance.

"new orders, we're going back to the beach, transport will be waiting for us." John said. Everyone climbed back in the Warthogs and headed back to the beach. Their transport was waiting for them.

"anyone need a pick up?" Ramius asked. Their old Huey gunships were waiting for them. Despite everything, every member smiled. It was a while since they used these old birds, and they were very successful at what they did.

"everyone hop on, we're taking this fight to them." John ordered. The massive, over-sized Huey gunships took to the skies.

"make those guns purr, Nikolai." Carter ordered. The massive amount of Gatling guns, cannons, missile and rocket pods let loose, destroying the multiple Banshees and AA wraith tank, as well as shredding several Brutes on the island below.

"keep flying, take us to the third tower! Expect heavy resistance!" John ordered. The Huey's flew to the next tower flanked by several allied Hornets and Pelicans.

"third tower in sight, Commander. No sign of General Shepherd or his team." a Pelican pilot reported.

"roger that, keep up the assault." Keyes ordered. The Huey gunships performed true to what Marco 'Ramius' Nikolai envisioned; an overly-armed, fast-attack gunship that could carry a large amount of troops into the thick of battle. The shielding held strong, despite that they were prototypes. The Arbiter's Phantoms decloaked and joined in the fight. With their aerial support gone, the Loyalists were slaughtered and bombed off the face of the Ark with extreme ease. After all the enemy ground forces were eliminated,

"Chief, find an LZ. Make your way into the tower." Captain Keyes ordered.

"alright, let's move. Nikolai, once we're on the ground, take the gunships back to the ship and get back in another bird. I'm officially giving you command of the entire air strike force."

"I thought you didn't have that jurisdiction."

"doesn't matter. Get these Hueys back to the ship, we can't lose them. We'll be fine down here, move it." John ordered. The Task Force, now joined with a large contingent of Elite warriors, stormed into the building.

"watch your flanks. And be ready for anything." John ordered.

"like those Hunters and Drones?" Petrenko asked.

"yes. Put 'em down." John ordered. A massive hail of bullets, plasma rounds and grenades slammed into the above mentioned forces, killing them instantly. The walls were stained with blood and punctured with bullet rounds.

"move out." Carter said plainly. They just killed anything they saw. Whatever emotion they felt, it was numbed to the point of nonexistence. The Brutes stood no chance against the 141; the Elites were very impressed, wondering why they didn't include the humans in the Covenant all those years ago.

"alright, I'll go up there alone. Makarov, gimme a satchel charge." John ordered.

"here you go." the Russian terrorist gave him a very bulky package. It consisted of 45 kilos of C4 and 90 kilos of C12, all tightly bound by det cord. The strap itself was covered with self-made stielhandgranites and overcharged plasma grenades.

"lunatic." John muttered, wondering how Makarov managed to survive the war without having any part of his body being blown to pieces. Activating the lift, John's mind was very blank as he journeyed upward. He knew the Flood would come, but he figured he had enough ammunition to deal with them. He was getting tired of fighting CQB with the Brutes, so he figured the charge would be enough to take care of them. He primed the detonator and chucked it once it got to the top. The resulting explosion vaporized whatever Brutes stood at the end, as well as creating a small crater in the ground and forever scarring and scorching the walls. The controls were still working, however.

"damn, Forerunner tech is stronger then I thought." John muttered to himself as he brought the shield down. John looked out and saw the Shadow of Intent hovering overhead the citadel, preparing to deliver the final blow to Truth. _where the hell is Shepherd?_ John thought.

"now, Prophet. Your end has come at last." Rtas said. A massive slipspace rupture appeared and High Charity appeared, absorbed by the Flood.

"High Charity? BY THE GODS, BRACE FOR IMPACT!" Rtas yelled. Several chunks of the ship broke off, one slamming into the assault carrier. Another massive chunk flew off and smashed into the windows. John knew all too well who would come out. _it never gets easy_ he thought as he raised his MA5C. Flood Infection Forms and Combat Forms ran out. Armor-piercing 7.62 rounds tore them to shreds before they got close to the SPARTAN.

"Shipmaster, what's your status?" Captain Keyes asked.

"significant damage! Weapons systems disabled!"

"alright, move to a safe distance! Stay away from the Flood!"

"why would the parasite come here?" the Elite commander asked.

"the Ark is out of range of all active installations! Priority: we must contain this outbreak before-" Guilty Spark began.

"NO! First we kill Truth, then we deal with the Flood." Keyes snapped angrily. John jumped down and linked up with the 141 and the Elites, who were currently engaging the Flood.

"how did I know something like this would happen?" Dempsey asked.

"because you're down in the dumps and now taking LSD to take the pain away?" Reznov replied.

"I don't take LSD!" the Marine corporal defended. After the Flood was defeated, they ran outside, where a Separatist Phantom and several Scorpions, Warthogs, Mongoose's, Wraiths, Ghosts, and captured Prowlers waited for them.

"quickly, I must see the point of impact; assess the damage to the Ark." Spark said.

"to the top of these hills, Oracle, no higher. We can't risk your capture by the Flood either." the Arbiter said. The two hopped in the Phantom and flew away.

"Doc, go back to the ship and begin to prep the Wunderwaffe Cannons in case we need them. Even Richtofen built them, he's expendable. You're not, we can't risk losing you." John ordered, not realizing he insulted Richtofen and essentially the entire 141 by saying they were all expendable; which they weren't.

"chief, the Shadow of Intent is out of action, and the space battle knocked out 94% of my weapons. I need you to kill the prophet; the Flood's just going to put pressure on him and accelerate his plans. Get to the citadel and kill him." Captain Keyes ordered.

"Nikolai, bring the entire air force over to the citadel, bomb it until it's non existent." John ordered.

"what if General Shepherd's in there, are we gonna bomb him as well?" Nikolai asked. John stopped for a moment; General Shepherd was one helluva tactician and a good member of the 141, as well as a good man and friend to the Chief. But John also knew that plenty of humans died during the war, one more soldier dead wouldn't dead make any everlasting effect in the grand scheme.

"there's a small chance he might survive. We're just gonna have to take it. You have your orders, captain Ramius."

"roger that, beginning the assault." the Russian pilot said. Overhead, a massive wave of human and Covenant flying machines flew overhead to attack the citadel.

"you're sure about your decision?" Carter asked.

"I'd do it again, given the chance." John harshly growled. All the humans and Elites boarded their respective vehicles and headed to the citadel, blowing up everything that got in their way. The ground started to shake rather violently.

"earthquake?" an Elite asked.

"no. bombing run." Buck responded. They almost didn't want to see the destruction, but they rounded the corner and witnessed a massive, terrifying display of aerial firepower they never seen before, and probably wouldn't see again in their lifetimes, other than a glassing. Hornets, Pelicans, attack helicopters and gunships, Banshee's, Phantoms, Longswords, Seraphs, everything both parties could muster in the air was currently bombing the shit out of the citadel and the surrounding areas.

"damn. That's a site you won't forget." Jun said softly. The armored convoy stopped and everyone climbed out, helmets off, wanting to witness the destruction and death of the Prophet of Truth with their own eyes. The explosions got bigger and louder. Snow was flying all over the place as well as rock, rubble, and the occasional piece of steel. Three Scarabs jumped down, which was a bad mistake. They were almost instantly pummeled to scrap metal as their inhabitants died a horrible death. The Loyalist ground vehicles didn't stand a chance as well. After hours of the bombing run, everyone had expended their ammunition. After all the smoke cleared, the destruction was extremely obvious. All the snow and rock was gone, revealing the scarred and scorched metal underneath. There were three massive burning hunks of metal that used to be Scarabs.

"now that is what I call a bombing run." John said. The 141 agreed with him, although they secretly thought he should've called it off. At any point the tunnels could've caved in on them, trapping and possibly killing them. Not to mention the pilots could've gotten careless and dropped their ordinance on them.

"alright, let's get down there. You Elites hold this position, we'll go in and kill that bastard." John ordered. The Elites wanted to with the humans, but thought better against it. They figured they should have the honor of killing Truth, because he was the one that began the war against the humans. At the entrance,

"Spark, open up, we got a prophet to bag!" Johnson yelled. The light bridge opened up and the Task Force 141 ran across, ready to finish the mission. They also heard Truth begin his sermon, it was broadcasted on the walls. John also felt another Cortana moment come on. _it asked, and I answered. For a moment of safety, I unleashed damnation on the stars_ John knew; Cortana led the Flood to the Ark. But why? Of course he knew the answer but it seemed so long ago, more like a distant memory that seemed to fade away with every passing moment.

"my faithful, stand firm. Though our enemies crowed around us, we tread the blessed path. In a moment, I will light the rings. And all who believe, shall be saved!" he declared. On the screen, it showed a slightly wounded General Shepherd being held by a Brute. He was punching the alien the face, but had no effect.

"Chief, how close are you?" Commander Keyes asked.

"nowhere near close enough." John muttered incredulously. He didn't even know how he would squeeze the entire task force into the elevator, it was just too small.

"hold position, commander. I got an idea." Ramius said over the comm. In the control room of the citadel, Shepherd was thrown on the floor.

"come on. That the best you got?" Shepherd taunted. The Brute huffed in amusement and picked him up. After growling in pain,

"come on, King Kong. Why don't you impress me?" Shepherd muttered.

"stop, you imbecile! He wants you to kill him! I would prefer that you did not." Truth said slowly. Shepherd was slammed on the panel.

"what's the matter big shot? Can't start your own damn party?" Shepherd growled angrily.

"I admit: I need your help. But that secret dies with all the rest." Truth said, implying that he was gonna kill Shepherd. They didn't notice a heavily armed Apache gunship shoot the glass off and smash through. Once it was inside, the pilot began shooting the Brutes with it's chain gun. Only one pilot was that crazy, and Shepherd knew it.

"get outta here, Nikolai!" he yelled.

"not without you." the pilot replied. He suddenly realized his mistake: there was hardly any room to maneuver here, and attempting to land to gather the general would be impossible. And to make matters much worse, he ran outta bullets. He expended his rockets and missiles a long time ago.

"aw shit, I'm outta ammo." Nikolai muttered. A Brute Stalker jumped up and grabbed onto the chopper. Nikolai quickly grabbed his Desert Eagle to shoot the alien, but the Brute smashed through the cockpit and tore him out from the flying craft and threw him to the ground, knocking him out cold. The Brute, however, lost his grip and fell to his death, leaving the chopper hovering there. No one paid any attention to that, however.

"Nikolai, wake up!" Shepherd yelled, believing the pilot to be dead.

"your forefathers wisely set aside their compassion, steeled themselves for what needed to be done. I see know why they left you behind." Truth said. Shepherd didn't have it anymore to resist; he couldn't believe that a good friend died trying to save his life. Truth had a smug look on his face as he pressed Shepherd's hand on the pad, causing the rings to glow and the stand to rise up. At the very end, the elevator rose up, dumping off the Task Force 141. The manner in how they got everyone up there wasn't exactly what they wanted; the SPARTAN's and the Arbiter were at the bottom, holding up the ODST's, then the ODST's help up the rest of the squad. So everyone was busy sitting on each other's shoulders, as well as other….. Odd positions. Needless to say, tempers were very, very, high; everyone was very close to killing each other.

"why'd the hell did you have to try and drink your damn vodka, Nikolai, it spilled all over me!" Romeo yelled out.

"well I do not like climbing!" the Russian drunk yelled back.

"well that's easy for you, I'm pretty sure someone was giving it to me up the ass! Felt like a rifle was sticking my rear end! Who was it?" Foley yelled, convinced that someone was trying to rape him.

"who gives a shit about that, I had to contend with Dutch sitting on my damn shoulders! Bastard farted while on top of me!" Jorge hollered.

"OKAY, THAT'S ENOUGH! EVERYONE WANTS TO KILL EACH OTHER, FINE! DO IT WHEN WE'RE DONE WITH THE MISSION!" John screamed angrily. He felt the same anger as everyone else, but he was more concerned on the mission then expressing his anger. He would do that soon, however. Two massive Flood Pure Forms dropped down. Instantly, guns and an Energy sword were drawn.

"do not shoot, but listen! Let me lead you safely, to our foe! Only you can halt what he has set in motion." the Gravemind spoke. The 141 didn't trust him, but they had no choice.

"alright, let's move. And watch your backs, it's every man and woman for him and herself now." John ordered. The 141 and the Flood pushed across the bridges, killing the last of the Covenant defense. Truth preached sermons to try and bolster the defense of his last troops, but it was all for naught. The 141 and the Flood just killed them all; no hesitation, no remorse, no mercy. When they got to the end, they activated the bridge and saw an Apache helicopter hovering in the air, it's fuel now getting low. They saw Shepherd sitting down, staring blankly ahead, holding Nikolai's dog tags.

"just so you know, he's still alive. Just not breathing as much." Kat said.

"I know. I just checked him. I'm waiting for him to wake up so I can kill him to making me think he was dead."

"and you care, why?" Emile asked.

"during the final stages of the Battle of New Mombassa, I sent a task force of 34,000 men and women to grab a vital asset out of the city. Lost 'em all. I made a promise to myself that day that I wouldn't send any more men and woman on suicidal missions, nor would I order anyone to pull me out if I felt it was suicide. Apparently, this bastard never got the message." Shepherd muttered.

"Shepherd, three words: get over it! Plenty of people have died during the war, one dead pilot's not gonna make any difference." John scolded the elderly general as he used his jetpack to bring the Apache closer. John pulled out his flask and dumped all his vodka on the pilot.

"uh, what happened?" Ramius asked.

"Shepherd wants to kill you." John asked.

"okay then." Ramius said, not caring about the death sentence. He and Shepherd climbed in the Apache, waiting to leave the hell-hole. The Arbiter grabbed the Prophet by the neck and growled.

"can you see, Arbiter? The moment of salvation is now at hand."

"it will not last!"

"your kind, never believed, in the promise of the Sacred Rings."

"lies for the weak." the Gravemind spoke from Truth, who was now being slowly infected. "beacons for the deluded." the Arbiter angrily activated his sword.

"I will have my revenge. On a prophet, not a plague!" the Arbiter warned.

"my feet tread the path. I shall become a god!" Truth stammered, becoming more deluded by the second.

"you will be food, nothing more." the Gravemind rumbled. The Arbiter turned Truth's head to see Captain Dare pressing her hand on the panel, deactivating the rings.

"NO!" he screamed, horrified. No one noticed the dead Flood Combat Form slowly take life.

"I… AM…. TRUTH! THE VOICE OF THE COVENANT!" Truth bellowed weakly. Thel grabbed his neck tightly, choking him.

"and so, you must be silence." he growled, stabbing Truth in the back. Thel let out a victorious roar at the dead prophet. Every member of the 141 removed their helmets to see the dead prophet. Those who smoked or drank did so, letting out a toast to signify that the man, or alien, who waged a genocidal war against their people was finally dead.

"alright, people, pack it all up. Let's get the fuck outta here and get the fuck home." John sighed, grinding out his cigarette, putting his helmet back in. The ground began to rumble, making everyone wonder what it was. Suddenly, massive tentacles belonging to the Gravemind reached out. Nikolai quickly piloted the Apache out of the control room, but not before a tentacle slapped the war machine, sending it flying.

"you guys wanted to know what the Gravemind was? Here he is." Kat said. Everyone pointed their guns at the tentacles, knowing their weapons were rather useless.

"now the gate has been unlatched, headstones pushed aside. Corpses shift and offer room, a fate you must abide." the massive alien creature rumbled.

"just so you know, he always speaks like that. This shit sucks, we traded one enemy with another." John said. The tentacles ducked away. Combat Forms began assaulting the 141 relentlessly.

"bastard betrayed us!" Buck yelled.

"oh really, I thought he was just sending his soldiers for the fun of it!" Takeo yelled sarcastically.

"just keep shooting! Get back to the lift!" John yelled. He couldn't believe he hadn't seen this coming. _damn, I must be getting old_ John thought to himself. Sentinels began arriving and helped the humans clear the temple of the Flood. When they finally got to the very end,

"down the hole, now!" John yelled. Once again, the 141 managed to cram themselves in a small hole, jumping down to the bottom. When they got out at the bottom,

"we're never doing that again." Carter sighed.

"definitely." Roebuck muttered, slinging his rifle. John didn't say anything; he spotted something he knew too well, and began walking away.

"what is it?" Richard asked. John didn't answer. The 141 slowly followed him, still wary of the Flood. Amused, John rounded a corner and followed the holo-image of Cortana to what appeared to be some sort of controls. Pressing down, the panel opened up and the 141 stepped out onto a large balcony, where they witnessed a magnificent sight: Installation 04B was slowly rising out from the depths, making almost everyone drop their jaws.

"it's a replacement ring, for the one I destroying using the Autumn." John explained.

"this thing can build more rings." Veronica sighed. Everyone except John was in shock.

"so this is Cortana's plan." Jorge said in wonder.

"when did you know?" John asked hoarsely. 343 Guilty Spark popped out behind them, wondering if he would get shot.

"just now. But, I did have my hopes. What will you do?" Spark asked.

"light it." John said, with more determination then he felt at the moment.

"then we are agreed, a tactical pulse will completely eradicate the local infestation! I will personally oversee the final preparations." Spark began muttering to himself as he flew off toward his new home.

"how are you gonna light it?" Thel asked. John stared at the wreckage of High Charity. Everyone followed is gaze.

"any volunteers?" John asked. Even though he had sent the Task Force 141 on plenty of suicide mission over the course of the war, he could never bring himself to order anyone to follow him inside. And they all knew it. For a long time, no one spoke up.

"I'll go." a gruff male voice came out.

"you sure about this, Dempsey?" John asked. The veteran American Marine nodded his head.

"same here. I'll help you bust Cortana out." Takeo said.

"eh, as long as I got vodka with me, I'll go." Nikolai muttered drunkenly.

"I always wondered how my Wunderwaffe's would work against the Flood."

"you wanna find out, now's a damn good chance. You wanna come?"

"I'll go." the Nazi scientist said with a bit of an odd chuckle.

"alright. Everyone get back to the Morning Sun. If you four are gonna help me rescue Cortana, I want you in ODST body armor, the new one. No exceptions. And stock up on as many DG weapons you can carry, bring the DG-10's as well." John ordered.

"yes sir."

"Carter, here are your orders. If we're not back in 18 hours, I want you to bomb this place with everything we got. MAC rounds, missiles, rockets, nukes, I don't care. Just don't leave anything alive in this sector. Then get your ass back to Earth."

"it's been an honor, sir." Carter said. Even though he and the rest of the 141 had a plan to 'take care' of their CO, they couldn't help but feel this was going to be the last time they would all see him alive.

December 11th, 2552

Unidentified Alien Artifact [Installation 00]

Covenant Capital [High Charity]

A Covenant Phantom flew towards the wreckage of High Charity. Finding an opening, the Elite pilot activated the grav lift and lowered the five human warriors down into the flood-infested hell hole.

"Chief, I'll round up all our survivors, fall back to the Morning Sun. Arbiter's doing the same with the Elites. Good luck, all of you." Carter said over the comm. The single SPARTAN and four ODST's slowly walked inside the alien ship, wondering what they would encounter. They were all armed with the Wunderwaffe weapons that were originally created to give them an edge in combat. Now they were banned from use because of their abilities to create zombies. But for this mission, they didn't care. All they wanted was to grab Cortana and get her out.

"alright. Keep your helmets on, keep your wits about you, and keep your weapons charged. Everyone and everything's hostile. Don't hesitate to shoot." John ordered.

"we can all trust each other on that last one." Dempsey said, cocking his DG-4 rifle. Infection Forms came out first. They were shot instantly.

"let's move." John ordered. The five soldiers crept through the alien ship, their boots squishing the flood matter beneath them. Anything they saw come at them, they killed. Combat Forms then came at them. Richtofen's DG-2 rifle fried them instantly, while John and Dempsey's DG-4 set them on fire. Nikolai and Takeo wielded DG-9. Since they were plasma machine guns, they had the same effect on the Flood as Covenant plasma weaponry.

"OOH-RAH, SLAYING FREAK BAGS SINCE 1945!" Dempsey yelled, firing his rifle at a Brute Combat Form, burning it down instantly. A Long Ranged Form mounted on the wall and began firing it's shards. Nikolai switched his rifle and pulled out his DG-5 rocket launcher, blasting a large hole in the wall.

"TASTE RUSSIAN HOSPITALITY!" he taunted as he began blasting the Flood to pieces.

"Nikolai, watch your fire." John warned. An Elite Flood form wielding an energy sword charged the group. Takeo drew out his Samurai sword, which was heavily modified so it could duel against Energy Swords.

"die for the emperor!" the Japanese soldier challenged. He was still loyal to Japan, even though WWII was long over. After a minute of parrying, Takeo sliced the enemy in half, killing the infection form that lay residing in it's chest.

"alright, let's move." John ordered. They passed through another porta, blasting their way through any opposition they found. John lowered his DG-4 rifle and pulled out duel-wield Ray Guns, blasting anything that came in his sight.

"THE BLOOD, OH WHAT JOY TO SEE BLOOD!" Richtofen cackled insanely.

"hey, stay away from my vodka! And stay dead this time, freak!" Nikolai yelled, literally bashing a Flood Form's head in with his boot.

"LET'S MOVE! JUST KILL WHATEVER YOU SEE!" John hollered. The five-man Flood slaying team ran through the infested High Charity, killing anything they saw, despite the Graveminds attempts to stop them. After another Cortana moment,

"hey Chief, we should cut the comms off from each other. No offense, but I can't stand having Cortana in my face, it's creeping me out." Dempsey said.

"yeah, and Mr. Tentacle man is getting on my nerves, he won't let me drink vodka!" Nikolai protested.

"how can you drink vodka at a time like this, now isn't time to be drinking." Dempsey said.

"nonsense, now is perfect time for drink!" Nikolai replied.

"no, what I mean is, how can you drink with your helmet still on, I never saw you take your helmet off once." Dempsey asked. Nikolai was a little stumped. How _did_ he drink all his vodka with his helmet still on?

"don't think, Nikolai, you'll fry your brain." John sighed, he should've seen this coming: the Gravemind was communicating with John via his CNI transponder. But by doing so, he was able to hack the waves and transmit to everyone else.

"alright. Cut the comms off. But remember, wherever I go, follow me. Kill whatever you see, and if I wave at you to leave, you get the hell out. Understand?"  
>"yes sir." the four replied. They continued moving and killing, leaving behind a trial of destruction and empty vodka bottles. After shooting their way through, they found themselves in the reactor room, which looked ready to blow.<br>"I don't like the looks of this." Takeo said, although no one could hear him. John motioned for the four to follow him across the bridge, blasting anything he saw. When they got on the other side and ran down the hallway before the final door, John removed his helmet.

"you four stay here. Don't let _anything_ get past you." John ordered.

"don't worry, Chief. We'll give these freak bags plenty of hell." Dempsey said a little proudly. John put his helmet back on and went through the door.

"alright, get into defensive positions. We should put claymores on the entrance, they won't suspect that." Takeo said.

"smart idea, let's do that. We should also put some of Nikolai's vodka there as well so we can burn these freaks." Dempsey suggested.

"NO! I WILL NOT SACRIFICE MY PRECIOUS VODKA JUST TO KILL SOME FLOOD FREAKS!" Nikolai yelled.

"okay, did you seriously call your vodka 'precious?' " Dempsey asked. Nikolai began blushing violently. If it wasn't for the helmet, they'd see how embarrassed he was.

"total blackmail." Richtofen cackled. As they began setting up their defenses, John was busy smashing the stasis field out of existence. Once it was gone,

"you found me. But so much of me is wrong… out of place. You might be too late." Cortana said weakly. John knelt down and removed his helmet.

"you know me, Cortana. When I make promise…." John started.

"you… keep it. I _do _know how to pick 'em." Cortana said a little amused.

"lucky me. Do you still have it?" John asked, hoping that this mission wasn't in vain. Cortana gathered herself up and returned to her old self.

"the Activation Index from the first ring. A little souvenir I held on to, just in case." Cortana said, showing an image of the Index.

"got an escape plan?" she asked, looking at the exit.

"thought I'd shoot my way out. Mix things up a bit." John said with a cocky smile on his face, pulling up his DG-2 rifle. Cortana smiled at that. Standing up, John put his helmet back on and removed the data chip. With Cortana now back inside, he slid the chip back in his head and sighed as he felt the ice-cold feeling go down his spine. For some odd reason, it felt more cold then usual.

"just keep your head down…. There's two of us in here, you know." Cortana said a little jokingly.

"Cortana, are you still here?" John slowly asked. She knew what he meant by that.

"I'm all here, Chief. All of me." she replied.

"that's good. Let's get outta here." John said, walking out the door, startling the four soldiers.

"jeez, you startled me! Ever hear of knocking first?" Dempsey growled.

"nice to see you too, Tank. You didn't tell me they came along." Cortana said, turning the comms back on.

"I asked for volunteers, and they signed up." John said.

"okay, we got Cortana back. Now let's get the hell outta here before I run outta vodka." Nikolai said, dropping another bottle. They ran back out into the reactor room, killing more Flood.

"wait, we need to buy some time. This reactor… start a chain reaction. We need to destroy High Charity." Cortana said a little weakly. More Flood swarmed around, but they quickly fell. Nikolai used his DG-7 and utterly destroyed the reactors. The Gravemind roared in pain and anger.

"serves you right, you bastard. You guys hurt it, but not for long. We need to get to Halo, destroy the Flood once and for all!" Cortana stated.

"well that's good news in the fact that we already got an exit planned out! Just follow Nikolai's empty bottles!" Dempsey said, laughing.

"it's true. Just follow the bottles, it'll lead us out." John said. Suddenly, a piece of the ship collapsed.

"how's your escape plan now?" Cortana joked.

"okay, that was a bad one. Got one, Cortana?" Richtofen asked, blasting another Stalker form.

"I'm analyzing the route ahead, I'll place a marker on your HUD's. Just keep moving!" Cortana urged. The five did as they were told and ran through a maintenance tunnel, running and killing, without any mercy or hesitation.

"I'm picking up a friendly contact. Who would be crazy enough to come in here?" Cortana asked. They found the Arbiter wielding a flame thrower, setting any Flood on fire.

"damn bastard, I thought I told him to stay on the ship." John muttered.

"that's because you didn't." Takeo reminded.

"how many hours has it been since we got here?" John asked. Nikolai burped.

"I need more vodka." he coughed up.

"you'll get more when we get home." John replied, hopping on the Pelican the Arbiter took.

"glad to see you're still alive, Chief." Thel said. John quickly hopped in the cockpit and gunned it, taking the Pelican and it's occupants away from High Charity. A massive explosion rocked the drop ship as they flew away towards the newly built Halo Ring.

December 11th, 2552

Unidentified Alien Construct [Installation 04B]

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

UNSC In Amber Clad

Shadow of Intent

Pelican Dropship 481

"we are aboard our respective ships. Humans and Elites. Will you not come with us, brother?" Rtas asked.

"no. this is our fight. And I will see it finished." Thel said determined. The Pelican dropship flew towards the ring. Dempsey, Richtofen, Nikolai and Takeo were in awe at the fact that such powerful weapons existed, let alone actually be built.

"Captain, do you have the super carrier?" Cortana asked.

"I'll hold position near the ring, I'll send down any transport to pick you up once your done. Oh, and Cortana? It's very good to have you back." Captain Keyes said over the comm. John maneuvered the damaged Pelican as best as he could to get as close to the control room, but the engines cut out at the last moment, forcing him to make a crash landing in a snowy canyon. The passengers disembarked from the destroyed craft.

"Halo, it's so new… unfinished. I'm not so sure what will happen when we fire it." Cortana said.

"we'll head for the portal. And we'll all go home." John said, grabbing a DG-9 machine gun.

"let's finish this." Dempsey said, grabbing a DG-4 rifle and dropping most of his weapons. Now, they had to travel light and fast to accomplish their objectives. John and Nikolai had DG-9 LMG's, while John had a DG-10 anti-vehicle weapon on his back. Dempsey had a DG-4 rifle while Richtofen was armed with his DG-2. Takeo had the DG-3 Thundergun in his hands, and Thel was armed with pack-a-punched plasma rifles. The six soldiers ran through the snow, eager to finish the battle once and for all. When they arrived at the foot of a massive, pyramid-like building, Flood Dispersal Pods began raining down on them.

"did you think me defeated?" the Gravemind roared.

"Flood Dispersal Pods! Control room's on the top of that tower! Get to it!" Cortana urged. The snow was slowly getting stained by the blood of fallen Flood forms, staining them forever a color of lukewarm yellow and orange. The tower wasn't spared as well.

"watch your backs, we got Flood all over this place! And don't take the sentinels for granted!" John snapped. While the sentinels were helping, the job of clearing the tower mostly laid on the shoulders of the Arbiter and the human task force.

"hey, robot! Open the door!" Nikolai yelled.

"of course reclaimer." Spark said, a little miffed at being called a robot. "Just as soon as you dispose of all proximate Flood threats. I'm afraid that containment protocols do not allow for-"

"who cares about protocol, I want to live to see tomorrow morning!" Nikolai yelled, taking down more Flood beings.

"you gotta love these guys." John muttered to himself, stifling his laughter. After holding off multiple waves of Flood, the doors finally opened up. The small squad ran through the hallways to the control room. When it opened up, they heard Flood roaring behind them. The doors sealed shut, but they didn't believe that would stop them.

"yank me, Chief." Cortana said. John did so, albeit extremely reluctantly.

"I'm not gonna lose her too." Richtofen said. John tossed the data chip to the Nazi and switched weapons, waiting for 343 Guilty Spark to arrive. When he did, John took aim and fired. The metallic slug flew down the impossibly wound-up rail coils lining the barrel and burst out the end, screaming toward the insane Monitor. The round slammed into the Monitor. His outer metal shell, constructed from the finest Forerunner steel did nothing to stop the slug from crushing any vital components inside. The remains of the shell clanged to the floor.

"why'd you shoot him, we needed him." Dempsey said.

"no we didn't." John replied, switching weapons. After Cortana activated the ring, Richtofen returned her to her proper owner.

"the Monitor dead?"

"yeah. And so is my shoulder. Now I know why we made these things in such limited numbers; they destroy your shoulder." John groaned, rubbing his right shoulder gingerly. As the facility began to fall apart,

"let's get the hell outta here." John ordered. Flood was ready to greet them, however.

"kill 'em all!" John yelled.

"hey, isn't that the title to a _Metallica_ album?" Dempsey asked.

"who cares, let's get outta here!" Takeo yelled. The warriors ran through exploding corridors, slaughtering Flood and hostile Sentinels alike.

"Captain Keyes, this is John-117, we need an immediate extract, right fucking now!" John yelled.

"say again, SPARTAN, I can barely hear you."

"Halo's falling apart and our Pelican's destroyed. We need an evac right now! And that bird's gotta have to come to us!" John yelled.

"roger that, hold on." the Captain ordered. As they held their ground, they saw the In Amber Clad roar overhead, her engines on fire.

"Captain, please tell me that wasn't our ride."

"it wasn't. And in case you're wondering, we transferred all the personal and equipment off the frigate to the Sun. Just several minutes ago, her engines suddenly exploded and sent her off in that direction."

"we still need that evac!" John yelled, not caring about the frigate.

"hold on, it's coming." Keyes said. A Pelican dropship soon arrived.

"welcome aboard, lady and gentleman. First stop, anywhere but this hell-hole." came the familiar voice of Michael Crespo.

"Mickey, get us outta here!" John yelled. The Pelican turned and gunned it, her engines pushed well beyond the red line. When it neared the Morning Sun,

"someone get that portal open, that ring fires, we all die!" John yelled. The slipspace portal slowly opened up. The Pelican crash landed inside the hanger bay.

"captain, get us in that portal now!" John yelled in the comm. The massive engines roared to life and pushed the damaged warship into the portal, away from the Halo ring. John slammed onto the floor, breathing heavily.

"we'll make it, Cortana. I promise you we'll make it." John sighed.

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><p><strong>Please read and review!<strong>


	12. Chapter 11

**Disclaimer: I own nothing. Also, this is what I like to call the 'Apocalypse Now' chapter. You see, I had watched Apocalypse Now yesterday, and I wondered if I could incorporate that story-line into my fanfiction story. I also wondered about the Spirit of Fire and her crew, what happened to them. So I did a little research on Halopedia concerning that subject. I sat down and typed this up. One thing, seeing as the story is AU, Sgt. John Forge is still alive. Also, the ending is purely my idea. If you'd like more background information, PM me. Enjoy!**

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><p>Chapter 11<p>

December 11th, 2552

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

The war was over, it was finally over.

"it's over, it's finally over." Jacob sighed, he was referring to the Battle of the Ark. He had no idea if the overall war was actually over or not. The UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun flew into the portal as Installation 04B fired, eliminating the last of the Flood. The Shadow of Intent had left some time ago. As the ship soared through the portal, the crew were settling down, grabbing some much needed rest. They were also cramming as many of the fallen as they could into the multiple morgues; they had lost so many lives during the space battle. In the secondary armory,

"so, what do we do when we get home?" Richtofen asked.

"hopefully, Lord Hood keeps up his end of the deal." Carter whispered.

"I still can't believe he ordered that bombing run just when we got to the Citadel, what is he, crazy or something?" Dempsey asked.

"I don't know, but we'll get rid of him soon enough." Kat said, removing her upper armor piece.

"all personal, this is Captain Keyes, we will be leaving the portal in 30 seconds. Hopefully, we'll be at Earth." Jacob sighed. The Morning Sun left the slipstream, although they weren't anywhere near Earth.

"Cortana, can you tell me where we are?" Jacob asked.

"I'm not sure where we are, captain. If I didn't know better, then that slipspace portal dumped us out in the middle of nowhere."

"can you get a fix on our position?"

"checking….. I honestly don't know where we are. And for that matter, I don't know where the Elite ship is either. The portal must've taken them back to Earth." Cortana said.

"okay then, one ship all alone in the middle of nowhere. Just great." Keyes sighed, lighting his pipe.

"sir, I'm picking up a beacon. It's very weak, but I got a hold of it." Doc Brown said.

"can we hear it?"

A series of radio sounds, and light jazz-type music occurred before a deep male voice appeared, saying,

"Iteration 4528919."

A female voice then came on saying,

"This is UNSC A.I. SRA 889144 code-name 'Serina' serving onboard the UNSC Phoenix-class colony ship _Spirit of Fire_. Our slipstream drive is missing and most of the crew is in cryo. If any UNSC ship is hearing this, we request immediate help and assistance." the female voice ended. The male voice came back again.

"Iteration 4528920." the message repeated itself again.

"I thought the Spirit of Fire disappeared in 2531. What does Iteration mean?" John asked.

"this message has been repeating itself for around 21 years." Brown said.

"Cortana, is that true?" Jacob asked.

"21 years, 3 months, 16 days, 5 hours, and 33 seconds to be precise." she said with a smirk.

"go to action stations, I wanna know where the hell we are." Jacob said, pocketing his pipe.

"yes sir, action stations." Brown said, turning the alarm on and readying all the ship's weapons, which weren't many due to all the damages she sustained.

"Captain, do you want to initiate contact with the Spirit of Fire?" Cortana asked.

"let me think about it." Jacob sighed heavily. The Battle of the Ark still rang fresh in his mind; all he wanted to do was go home and drive the Covenant off Earth and finish the war. But now that they found the UNSC Spirit of Fire….. He turned around and leaned against a console. He accidentally hit the ship-to-ship comm system and inadvertently sent out a bunch of radio messages concerning the war, none of them were friendly or re-assuring. For some odd reason, Cortana didn't bother blocking them. On the Spirit of Fire, the A.I. Serina woke up the entire crew and brought the ship back online.

"Serina, sitrep." Cutter stated, walking on the bridge.

"an identified contact came out of slipspace a few minutes ago, it has all the classifications of a UNSC supercarrier, and they're holding away from our position at exactly 20,000 kilometers off our starboard bow."

"I think we should make contact them, find out if they're a UNSC ship or Insurrectionists."

"captain, you might want to wait. I've just received several radio transmissions; they're all rather horrifying if I say so myself."

"let's hear 'em." Cutter said as Forge, Anders, and Red Team arrived on the bridge, as well as the rest of the bridge officers.

"hear what?" Forge asked.

"this." Serina said. On the speakers, Carter's voice said something that made everyone send shivers down their spines.

"_Col., there are no rebels. The Covenant are on Reach. Acknowledge? _[_Copy that, did you say Covenant?_] _Affirmative. It's the Winter Contingency, sir. _[_may God help us_.] "

After that, they heard nothing but screaming, gunfire, plasma fire, everything concerning the Fall of Reach. Jerome, Alice, and Douglas stiffened at all that; Reach was their home, it couldn't have been destroyed. That meant that the Covenant were now in the inner colonies.

"I got another one, this one's even worse." Serina said.

"what could be worse then Reach falling?" Forge angrily demanded. Captain Keyes' calm, stoic voice then came on.

"_Attention, all UNSC colonies, redirect all armed UNSC warships back to Earth for defense and counterattack; Earth is under attack by Covenant forces, I say again, redirect all armed UNSC ships to Earth for a regroup and counter-attack against attacking Covenant ships, Earth is now under attack. How copy, over?_" the entire bridge was silent when they heard that.

"Serina, get this ship ready for combat, prepare to jump us to Earth!" Cutter ordered, forgetting that they didn't have a slipstream drive.

"sir, the Cole Protocol-"

"FUCK THE COLE PROTOCOL! EARTH IS UNDER ATTACK; PROTOCOL DOESN'T MATTER NOW!" Cutter suddenly yelled, making everyone jump. After he calmed down,

"I'm sorry. But the Cole Protocol doesn't matter anymore. We have to get back to Earth and do our part. Serina, can you contact that Supercarrier and ask them for assistance, seeing that we don't have an FTL engine?"  
>"they're contacting us, actually."<p>

"let's hear it."

"_Spirit of Fire, this is Cpt. Keyes of the Supercarrier, Rise of the Morning Sun. we heard your SOS beacon and we are offering assistance. How copy, over?_" Keyes asked.

"that name doesn't sound familiar, must be a new ship." Cutter mused.

"that's the most likely answer, seeing as the current year is 2552." Serina replied. Cutter stared at her.

"you're kidding, the year is 2552?" Cutter asked, not believing he was in cryo that long.

"I wish I was."

"captain Cutter, this is Captain Keyes, we're docking with your ship, with your permission or not. This is a warning in advance, some of our soldiers aren't exactly wearing standard BDU's, they aren't using up-to-date weapons, and you're gonna find a lot of Nazi swastika's inside the corridors and in certain rooms. Also, if you come across any locked doors that say to keep out, you stay the fuck away from those rooms. You copy?" Keyes asked very sternly.

"yes sir." Cutter said, wondering what was all that about. In the Morning Sun,

"what rooms are you talking about again?" John asked, leaning against a counter toying with a Desert Eagle.

"there's a laboratory 12 decks beneath us, Dr. Richtofen and I have been experimenting with 115 and a disconnected teleporter; we've been trying to bring the dead back to life without turning them into zombies, but it never worked." Brown said.

"and the last thing we need is some idiots from 2531 messing with my teleporters!" Richtofen said rather loudly and angrily.

"calm down, Richtofen." John said with a light smile, lighting a cigarette.

"what do you mean you've been experimenting with the dead, you told me all your attempts in 1945 failed." Keyes said, smoking his pipe.

"it's because I'm a 2000-year old idiot who can't learn the simplest lesson: the dead are dead, they should stay that way." Richtofen sighed.

"hey, didn't you explain to me once that it was actually Dr. Maxis that created the zombies, you were experimenting on creating super-soldiers? You were actually very skeptical of the zombie army." Cortana said.

"yes, you're right. But since Dr. Halsey and Col. Ackerson beat me to the punch for the super-soldiers, I figured, why not try and bring our dead soldiers back to life? You can guess how that turned out." Richtofen said, a dead-pan look on his face.

"alright, Spirit of Fire is docking with our ship, I'm cycling the airlock now." Brown said, his fingers dancing across the console like a professional piano player.

"I'll meet them at the airlock. I want you and Noble Team down there as well. And aim for the knees." Keyes said. The SPARTAN's only chuckled at that.

"I'm serious, aim for their kneecaps should they take a pot-shot at the Arbiter." Keyes sighed. He was dead serious. When they got to the door, the airlock opened up. Keyes remained rather defiant; his hand next to his Magnum should the worse happen. The airlock opened up to reveal Captain Cutter, three SPARTAN's behind him, along with a Marine in old BDU's with the rank of Sergeant and two extra marines, along with a woman in a lab coat. They were all a little frightened to see John and Noble Team in their Mk. IV armor with the chainsaws on their arms, also adding to the fact that all of them, especially John, were covered in the blood of fallen enemies and allies alike. They had all gotten rid of the needle-guns a long time ago. John got rid of his during the beginning battle of Old Mombassa, he felt it was nothing more than dead weight.

"Captain Jacob Keyes, Rise of the Morning Sun. Master Chief Petty Officer John-117, Commander Carter-259, Lt. Commander Catherine-320, Warrant Officer Jun-266, Warrant Officer Emile-239, Chief Warrant Officer Jorge-052, and Lt. Richard-312."

"Captain James Cutter, Spirit of Fire. Sgt. John Forge, Cpl. Mendizza, Cpl. Riker, Sierra-092, Sierra-042, Sierra-130, and Professor Ellen Anders."

"I see you still call your SPARTAN's 'Sierra'. I prefer to call them by their real names; they don't mind it at all."

That was a lie; Noble Team didn't mind. But through all that John and Jorge have been through, one of the things that still pissed 'em off was superior officers calling them by their names, even if they were in their armor. That SPARTAN training never goes away.

"Captain Keyes, could I speak to you in your office?" Cutter asked.

"be my guest." Keyes said, letting the officers walk by. As they headed down the hall,

"this is one helluva ship. I don't recognize the name, however."

"it's a new vessel with the most advanced technologies we got. You can thank Dr. Emmett Brown and Dr. Edward Richtofen; UNSC scientists residing onboard our ship. They helped us a lot keeping this thing up and running." Jacob said.

"the last I heard, you were a Lt Cmdr. Now you're a captain, how'd you pull that off?" Cutter asked.

"I got promoted, simple as that." Keyes said, passing a teleporter.

"what's that?" Anders asked.

"it's a teleporter, Richtofen and Brown built them. We currently have 13 teleporters stationed in key positions around the ship. Helps move critical personal and supplies to the right positions during a crises, such as a fire-fight."

"but what's with the swastika?" Jerome asked. On the top was a massive Nazi swastika.

"Richtofen believes he's a part of the group called Illuminati, something about the Nazi's controlling the fate of the universe, total bullshit in my opinion. I've tried to get him to remove the swastikas, but he'd threaten to leave the ship. So, I've had no choice but to keep him onboard. He's one helluva scientist." Keyes said honestly.

"I'd like to meet with him." Anders said.

"I'll try and schedule a meeting with him. But you might wanna be careful, he's a little nuts." Keyes said as they entered his office. Keyes, Cutter, Anders, Forge and his two Marines sat down. The SPARTAN's, however, stood up. Red Team was on one side, John and Noble Team was on the other. The strange thing was that the 141 SPARTAN's had their helmets off. John then casually pulled out a cig, lit it, and then pulled out his flask and drank a large about of booze. Noble Team was very accustomed to him smoking and drinking. Jun himself lit a cig. Both of them took long drags in an attempt to calm themselves down. The war was still weighing heavily on them. Oddly enough, despite years of smoking and drinking, John and Jun never suffered any ill side effects from their habits, inwardly or outwardly. They only guessed it was the Element 115 in their bodies that kept that from happening. John stared at Red Team for a while.

"you guys wanna smoke or a drink?" he asked, offering a cigarette and his flask. They all shook their heads. John just shrugged as he put his flask back and took a long drag from his cig.

"I uh, never seen a SPARTAN drink or smoke." Cutter said. John only stared at Cutter that said, 'if you have a problem with my smoking and drinking, I'll kill you.' Cutter got the message and turned away.

"Captain, we came across several radio messages, probably from your ship, and I have to know the truth. I just have so many questions….." Cutter asked.

"yes, Reach is destroyed in case you were wondering." Captain Keyes said very calmly. Cutter and his crew started murmuring.

"then that means the Covenant are in the Inner Colonies, how the hell'd the war turn so badly?" Forge asked.

"I can't exactly answer that. HIGHCOM put together a plan to capture the Covenant Prophets, but that was scrapped when Reach was attacked." Keyes said.

"Prophet?" Anders asked. Keyes pulled up a picture of a Covenant Prophet, Truth to be exact.

"meet Mr. Ball-Chin, the last of the Prophets. He's dead now, so there's no need to worry." John said very coldly.

"we believe, no, we _know_ that these Prophets are the political leaders of the Covenant; they're at the very top of the Covenant command structure. Each individual race of the Covenant, well, except perhaps the Elites, worships them like they're gods. Do you have any more questions?"

"Captain, is it true that Earth is under attack?" Anders asked.

"it was under attack until we blew up their raggedy-ass fleet." Keyes said with a cocky smirk, remembering what MacTavish said when the Covenant attacked Mombassa.

"um, raggedy-ass fleet?" Cutter asked.

"the Prophet of Regret led a fleet of 13 ships against Earth. As you can imagine, he lost. The Prophet of Truth came almost immediately with reinforcements and destroyed half of our defenses. He then left and returned with an alien warship, something called a Forerunner Dreadnaught, a Keyship, to finish the job. He escaped the battle with that ship, even as we were attacking it. Hell, our weapons didn't do anything against his ship."

"do the Covenant have a foothold on Earth?" Douglas asked.

"in a manner of speaking, yes, they did. But it was more of an occupational foothold, they were looking for something. But we beat the Covenant back and followed Truth to the Ark, at least those stationed at New Mombassa and Voi. At the Ark, the Covenant Separatists helped us kill Truth. We don't know if the Covenant are completely gone from Earth or if we still have drive them off." Keyes replied.

"Covenant Separatists?" Alice asked.

"the Elites found that the Prophets lied to them about their so-called Great Journey where if they activated the rings, they would turn into gods. They split from the Covenant, along with several grunts and hunters." Jorge said, scratching his head.

"what rings?" Cutter asked.

"currently, there are six massive, artificial rings lying in wait throughout the galaxy called Halo Rings. The Covenant thought that if they activated them, they would become gods. They're wrong, those rings are doomsday weapons capable of destroying all life in the galaxy, the Forerunner built them to fight against the Flood." Jacob said.

"the Flood, is that some sort of parasitic race, we encountered something similar to that years go." Anders said.

"yes, that's true. We managed to defeat the Flood during our last mission, after they landed on Earth. We neutralized that threat by glassing the town of Voi, that's where they landed." Jacob said rather calmly as he drank some water.

"you had to glass Earth?" Douglas and Alice asked.

"didn't have much of a choice now, did we?" Keyes asked rather dangerously.

"captain, all we want to know is if the war is over or not." Cutter said, wanting to get to the truth.

"we honestly don't know, we were just on a very important mission to kill the last Prophet. We were actually going back to Earth when we picked up your distress call. You guys are free to roam the ship, but I should warn you ahead in advance, some of the stuff you won't like what you find. And some of these rooms…" Keyes said as he stood up.

"….are meant to be locked."

"trust me, you don't wanna go in some of them." John said, crushing his cigarette and downing the last of his vodka. Just then, the Arbiter walked in holding a DG-2 rifle.

"hey John, someone keeps messing with the barrel, the bolt always goes a little to the left when you shoot it." the Arbiter said.

"why the hell you asking me, go to Richtofen. He's the one that built it."

"why would I go to him, that Nazi's a fucking lunatic! Every time I go inside his lab, I have a nasty feeling he's fucking one of the corpses." Thel defended.

"okay, that's a little over the top." Emile said.

"I found a bunch of cum stains on a female corpse, I think he's suffering from necrophilia."

"oh really, what ticked you off?" Richard muttered.

"alright, go to Brown, he might know what to do." John said, not wanting the conversation to continue.

"eh, he's better then Richtofen, even though his lab smells scotch. I hate that smell." Thel muttered.

"what, you don't know?" Kat asked.

"know what?"  
>"Richtofen and Brown share the same lab. So yes, their lab has that scotch smell with violated corpses." Kat said with a smirk.<p>

"FUCK!" Thel yelled, clutching the rifle tightly at his predicament. He left the room, muttering curse words that cause the 141-SPARTAN's to smile. Cutter and his men, however, were shocked.

"what the hell is an Elite doing onboard this ship?" Cutter yelled.

Suddenly, Keyes and his SPARTAN's raised their weapons towards Cutter and his men.

"don't make me do this, Captain." Keyes pleaded, his Magnum was focused on Cutter's head. Forge knew that he was no match for a SPARTAN, let alone seven. Red Team knew they might have a chance, but seeing as these SPARTAN's were wearing new armor, they didn't want to know what would happen.

"yes, we have an Elite onboard. Arbiter Thel Vadem, the leader of the Covenant separatists. I know what I'm gonna say won't make sense, but I consider him to be a member of this crew and a good friend, as well as a good man. Or Elite, you get what I mean. I'll do anything I can to protect this crew and my ship, but don't push me. I got more powerful weapons onboard then you could possibly imagine; don't make me use them." Keyes sternly said. While it was true that he had very powerful weapons, most of his weapons were actually off line at the moment. Cutter had no choice but to stand down.

"stand down, everyone. I'll accept it, but I don't like it, captain. So, do you guys have any idea as to where we are?" Cutter asked.

"Cortana." Keyes asked. On the table, Cortana appeared. Seeing as she was 100% naked, all the guys stared at her.

"uh, who's she?" Forge asked, feeling his pants grow tight.

"I'm Cortana, I'm the shipboard A.I. for the Morning Sun, and I'm also John's personal A.I. as well." Cortana said, motioning toward John-117. Forge briefly thought what Cortana muttered in John's ears when no one was paying attention.

"you know where we are?" John asked.

"we're at the colony world, New Tokyo, on the far side of the Chameleon star system. I'm actually surprised we ended up out here

"I heard rumors that Chameleon star system was glassed." Carter asked.

"it was. Actually, they only glassed two of the planets, the other two didn't have any human settlements, that's why they were ignored."

"well, we got humans on one of them. New Tokyo, actually. Looks like a small military presence is here. I'm seeing what appears to be a destroyed frigate." Kat said, playing with the outer hull cameras.

"let's see it." Cutter asked. A destroyed UNSC frigate appeared on the side of the planet.

"the UNSC Nothing Else Matters. I thought that ship went missing in the mid-30's." John said.

"it did." Carter reminded him.

"so why isn't it glassed, I'm seeing major evidence of Forerunner technology. Covenant would've definitely landed to take it." Kat muttered beneath her breath.

"Forerunner, who are they?" Anders asked.

"in your travels, Professor, have you seen any odd technology that looks similar to this? Or this?" Kat asked as she began showing all the Forerunner technology, architecture and machinery the 141 encountered.

"yes, I have. I'm very familiar with that technology, actually."

"there you go, you're familiar with Forerunner technology. You might be able to help us out down there." John said cockily.

"so what are waiting for, let's go down there, see if we can find any survivors." Forge said.

"it's your call, Captain." Carter said. Keyes chewed on the tip of his pipe, pondering whether to send the 141 down to rescue any survivors. Kat did say there were survivors, and he had come to trust her judgment. Everyone trusted her. Keyes then came to a decision.

"alright, stuff the Spirit of Fire into the main hanger bay, we're going to the planet surface to see what's down there; see if there are any survivors." Keyes ordered.

"wait, you're taking the Spirit of Fire in as well?" Cutter asked.

"the more the merrier, besides, we need more redcoats if the shit hits the fan, I lost half my crew during the last battle." Keyes slightly exaggerated, causing Cortana, John, and Noble Team to laugh. They knew perfectly well what he was going at. Cutter and his crew, however, had no idea what he was talking about.

"alright, I'll assemble the squad and get the Huey's ready." John said.

"you guys have been using those choppers since that Raid on Reach, I'm surprised they haven't fallen apart yet." Cortana joked.

"one the perks of having your machinery being powered by element 115 is that they're nearly indestructible." John said before he unplugged Cortana.

"you guys wanna come along, I guarantee you, it'll be a blast." John said, walking out of the room with a cocky smile.

"what does he mean by that?" Jerome asked.

"just go down there with them, you might enjoy the company. And consider that a standing order."

"hold on, you can't order my men around-" Cutter began.

"under UNSC Article 55-alpha, section 5-beta, paragraph 1, any two commanding officers meet, the officer commanding the larger and more well equipped group has command of all UNSC forces present until further notice. It's standard protocol now." Keyes said. It was actually a lie, there was nothing like that. But Keyes was hoping on that since Cutter and his crew were asleep since 2531, they'd buy the lie as a new UNSC protocol.

"alright, they're all yours, captain." Cutter angrily sighed. Keyes was happy; the idiots fell for his lie; hook, line, and total sinker.

"who can you spare?"

"not a whole lot, I still need Marines to guard the ship."

"I can understand that."

"I'll send down Red Team, along with Sgt. Forge and several Marines. You're going down there too, professor."

"sir?" Anders asked.

"you said you're familiar with… Forerunner technology. They could use your help down there." Cutter said.

"I'll go."

"Sergeant Forge, you're gonna be her escort."

"nothing ever changes, eh captain?" Forge joked.

"alright, it's settled." Keyes said. He walked over to the wall and hit the comm button.

"Task Force 141, this is Captain Keyes. Get down to the hanger deck in full combat dress, the whole nine yards. Get the choppers ready for immediate departure, John one-one-seven will be the commanding officer." Keyes.

"Task Force 141?" Jerome asked.

"black ops squad; best group of warriors I got. You'll appreciate their help." Keyes smiled. The aforementioned personal walked down to the hanger deck, although they had to ask for directions because they had never been on a UNSC supercarrier before. When they got there, they found seven SPARTAN's, several ODST's, an Elite, and a lot of soldiers. What intrigued them most was that most of the soldiers wore old uniforms and armor from Earth's past. And almost all of them used old weapons that wouldn't dare be used against the Covenant.

"uh, are you John-117?" Forge asked the Chief.

"that's my name, don't wear it out." he smirked, causing the 141 to chuckle.

"hey John, are there gonna be waves down there?" Shepherd asked.

"why, so you can bring your board?" John asked.

"exactly. Why else would I ask?" Shepherd asked.

"you surf?" Forge asked.

"I was a surfer before I joined the military, I could hit any wave the oceans throw at me."

"alright, alright. You can bring your board." John sighed.

"I already got it, it's on the underside of my chopper." Shepherd said, kicking one of the enormous Huey choppers.

"jeez, these things are huge. Who built these?" Forge asked.

"I did." Ramius said.

"Sgt. John Forge, meet Marco 'Nikolai' Ramius. He's are main aircraft pilot and mechanical expert. You show him a busted up aircraft, he'll fix it, make it brand new, and then some." John smiled. Suddenly, the ship shook violently.

"what's going on?" Jerome asked.

"all hands, go to combat alert 1, we are under attack by anti-air weaponry, looks like UNSC-issued missiles." the ship shook even more violently.

"what was that?" Douglas asked.

"all hands, we're under attack by two Covenant super carriers. Captain Cutter, take your ship and destroy those anti-air batteries, I'll take on those carriers." Down in the Spirit of Fire,

"Serina, get the ship undocked and prep the MAC cannon, we need to take out those batteries!" Cutter ordered.

"aye sir, disconnecting the ship so we can all die against two superior Covenant vessels." Serina replied sarcastically. The smaller vessel pulled out and got into the fight. They then saw that the Morning Sun was heavily armed; she had more weapons then a supercarrier needed, although almost half of them weren't working at the moment.

"man, that's a lot of turrets." Cutter sighed.

"sir, am I imagining things, or does the Morning Sun come equipped with what appears to be energy shields?" Serina asked. The crew looked out the window and saw the plasma torpedoes fired from the covenant carrier impact against the shields on the Morning Sun.

"how the hell'd they get that?" Cutter wondered. As the Morning Sun gave a full broadside with her remaining weapons, the Task Force 141 got ready to drop down to the planet surface.

"hey Forge, you a surfer? You look like the kind of man that surfs in his spare time." Shepherd wondered.

"uh, I surfed before I joined up." Forge said.

"get this man a surfboard! We're gonna hit the waves when we get down there!" Shepherd said. Forge's surfboard was soon slapped on one of the choppers.

"alright people, get in the choppers, move!" John ordered.

"can these things carry SPARTAN's?" Anders asked.

"well, my chopper has three SPARTAN's, so yeah, they can carry us easily!" John yelled, getting into the pilot's seat. Ramius would be flying a Longsword fully loaded with incendiary weaponry, mostly napalm. The doors opened up, the choppers started up, and they flew out amidst the exploding flak rounds. Forge, Anders, and Red Team were surprised that the Huey choppers could carry SPARTAN's so easily. As the choppers flew closer to the surface of the inside of the sphere; everyone saw that the surface was covered in forest, and a couple of cities, and plenty of oceans.

"John-117, this is Captain Keyes." Keyes' voice came over the comm.

"what's up?" John asked.

"I just picked up a radio message from HIGHCOM. You guys aren't gonna like it."

"send it through!" Jorge yelled.

"alright. Col. Carl F. Figursky of the UNSC Army has been reported to have gone rogue, more likely insane, and has taken refuge here at New Tokyo with a team of ODST's and Army Troopers. It's safe to assume that he was the one who stole the frigate, so…."

"what are you saying?" Carter asked.

"they want any and all UNSC vessels to terminate Figurskys' command." Keyes said.

"come again?" Cortana asked.

"they want me to terminate with extreme prejudice."

"an assassination mission." Forge said.

"Chief, I'm passing it to you. It may seem I'm passing the buck, but you're our best chance at completing this mission. I'm sending you everything HIGHCOM has on the man." Keyes reported.

"Alright, where's the Colonel?" John sighed, scratching his head.

"down on the surface, it should look like Vietnam. I've designated the most plausible course where Figursky went; I'm calling it the 'Hung River.' I'll be dropping off a gunboat shortly, but you need to clear an LZ for the drop." Keyes said.

"the whole damn surface looks like Vietnam! Didn't they ever therefore this damn place, or did they fuck up the damn process?" Woods yelled.

"get me an LZ so I can drop the proper equipment, that's an order!" Keyes ordered sternly.

"yes sir. Alright, let's get the captain the LZ he needs." John sighed. They flew down to the surface and found a large Covenant airbase. It was clear that the Covenant had been here for some while.

"alright, we're taking that beach-head! You see those waves, I'm gonna surf them!" Shepherd yelled. Him surfing was more for him to see if he was still alive, still human. Losing New Mombassa had dealt a massive blow to him.

"get the music ready!" Mason yelled.

"music?" Forge yelled. Woods cranked on the radio. _Metallica_ blasted on the radio.

"you guys listen to flip music?" Forge asked.

"scares the hell outta the Covenant!" Veronica replied. As the Huey choppers got closer to their target,

"light 'em up!" Carter yelled. The choppers unleashed their full fury on the Covenant landing base, sparing no-one. Forge, Anders, and Red Team couldn't believe the SPARTAN's and ODST's could get along so well. They really couldn't believe that the squad and the Elite, this Thel Vadem, could get along so well like they were good friends. Down on the ground, the Covenant were getting slaughtered.

"okay, put us down there!" Shepherd yelled.

"sir, the Covenant are still down there!" Douglas yelled.

"IF I SAY IT'S SAFE TO SURF THIS BEACH, THEN IT'S SAFE TO SURF THIS BEACH! CHARLIE DON'T SURF! PUT US DOWN, NOW!" Shepherd screamed. Mason's chopper then got hit by a Brute Shot in the left engine, causing smoke to billow out. Oddly enough, it was still flying.

"do me the honors of lighting his ass up, Polonsky." Miller said. Polonsky pulled the bolt back on the M247 and tore the Brute to pieces. The choppers landed and immediately got shot at. As everyone hit the deck,

"okay, get my board!" Shepherd yelled. He spotted several humans already on the waves, more then likely, the rogue ODST and Troopers that went with Figursky. Shepherd pulled out a mega-phone.

"come on, let's see some surfing out there!" Shepherd ordered. Mortar rounds slammed into the water.

"get my board, now!" Shepherd yelled. Forge ran up with his rifle in his hands, not his board.

"you're not gonna surf?" Shepherd yelled.

"you sure it's safe for some R&R, General?" Forge asked.

"you're a pussy, Sgt. Forge! Get Nikolai to napalm that tree-line five meters back, I want some breathing room!" Shepherd yelled. Nikolai Belinsky was drunk, so he thought Shepherd meant him. He flung a Molotov cocktail, but he didn't make it. Not even close.

"I meant Ramius!" the Longsword flew close near the tree line and blew the trees to fiery fire-balls.

"you smell that?" Shepherd asked.

"sir?" Anders yelled, reloading another clip into her Magnum.

"I love the smell of napalm in the morning, smells just like victory. You know, years back, we napalmed a hill held by grunts for hours on end, there were so many of 'em that we couldn't move 'em. So we set the hill on fire. When it was over….. One day, one day this war's gonna end." Shepherd said, taking off his hat, jacket, ammo belt, T-shirt, boots, holster, and his rifle.

"you coming or not, Forge?" Shepherd asked, grabbing his board and running into the mortar-ridden waters. Despite that plasma mortars were raining down on the beach, the 141 didn't shoot back. They were just relaxing and watching Shepherd hit the waves.

"what is he, crazy or something?" Forge asked.

"General Shepherd may be a little crazy, but he's one helluva commander." Veronica said, cheering the general on. After what seemed like hours of Shepherd surfing mortar-ridden waves, he came back to the beach, a smile on his face.

"you don't know how to enjoy life if you haven't ridden waves pounded by mortars!" Shepherd yelled loudly. He put the board down and put his clothes and weapons back on.

"hey general?" Forge asked.

"yeah?"  
>Forge immediately swung a nasty left hook into Shepherd's face. Or tried to, Shepherd caught the fist and flung Forge on the ground. He then slammed a devastating elbow into the younger man's stomach, knocking the air out. He then pulled out his Ka-Bar knife and pressed it against his throat.<p>

"if you ever do that to me again, sergeant Forge, I will kill you. I may be older, but I probably got more fight in my finger then you do in your whole body. Let it go." Shepherd snarled, releasing the younger man. What he said wasn't an entire lie; the element 115 in his body did give him more stamina then most other Marines, but even he had his limits. Suddenly, a massive Luxury yacht that had been heavily modified to serve military purposes dropped on the water. Mortar launchers and HMG's were mounted all over the multiple decks. It looked like the old _Eclipse_ yacht John had seen in pictures long ago.

"here's your gunship. Proceed with the mission; don't come back until it's a complete success." Keyes said.

"yes sir." John muttered. They pulled the boat up close and everyone hopped in, taking various positions on machine gun turrets, mortar turrets, or just using their own rifles and machine guns. John took the wheel.

"hey Brown, you know more about Forerunner tech then most anyone here, do you have a good idea where any survivors might be?" John asked. Brown got up to the cockpit where John was and slung his MP5K SMG over his shoulder, gripping the handles of two .30 cal LMG's.

"until we know for sure where Figursky is, I can't help you out on Forerunner tech. We might find some, that might be good. In the manner of finding the colonel, just do what the captain said, head up the river." Brown said.

"okay people, we're going in. Bowman, music please." John said. Bowman turned a radio on and _Rammstein_ blasted on the radio.

"them Germans are so fucking smart. They created rockets, assault rifles, nuclear weapons, a lot of the stuff we have today dates back to the Germans. And they make damn good music as well." John said.

"yeah, you gotta thank them Nazi's, they created a lot of shit that if we didn't have today, we'd be worse off then we originally were." Brown said.

"what, you actually support the Nazi's?" Forge asked.

"I'm not saying it, but I do like that they were well ahead of their time. Hey Richtofen, you're a Nazi, right?" John asked.

"yeah, what gave it away, that I'm wearing a Nazi uniform from world war II?" Richtofen yelled, clutching his MP-40 tightly.

"just saying, you joined the Nazi's because you like to kill, right?" John lightly chuckled.

"yeah, yeah, yeah, that's what I did!" Richtofen snarled, then he walked away. He knew that John was pushing the fact that he was from the past, and didn't want to open that fact any further. Only the 141 knew that; everyone else thought he was crazy and believed in reincarnation. The massive yacht-turned-gunboat continued up the river, catching the attention of Covenant troops.

"here's where the fun begins, spin 'em up!" John yelled. The machine guns and mortar rounds began flying towards the Covenant. Enemy plasma rounds and grenades flew towards the boat, but they harmlessly bounced off the energy shield.

"how does this gunboat come with energy shields?" Alice asked.

"thank the Arbiter, he gave us the technology!" Woods yelled, firing his Commando at a Brute, bringing him down. The heavy machine gun and mortar fire drove the Covenant back, but none of them could tell if it was that, the heavy metal music, or a combination of both.

"alright people, stay on your toes, we don't know what's out there." John said. Night soon fell. As everyone went into the lower decks to get some sleep,

"I'll take guard duty tonight. Everyone get down below decks and get some rest." John ordered. Night soon fell, John was the only one awake. He quickly printed off all the papers on Figursky.

_Damn, this guy's been everywhere. Graduated 14__th__ out of 200, rose to the rank of Colonel in the army in a manner of only 2 weeks. Pretty fast. One hell of a record, we could've used more men like him against the Covenant. Why HIGHCOM would want to get rid of this guy, I'll never know._ John thought to himself as he lit a cigarette and began to comb over all the papers. Early the next morning, John quickly stuffed the papers away and took the wheel. "alright people, man the turrets, stay sharp and stay alive. We don't know what we're gonna face." Woods said loudly. Once again, John took the wheel. He slowly opened the throttle and the gunboat gained speed, gaining miles on the river at an incredible time. They had a few brief skirmishes with the Covenant, but they were quickly disposed off. Night soon fell, but everyone felt they were in good enough shape to keep going. So they kept going. Jerome, Alice, and Douglas were chatting with Jorge.

"these other SPARTAN's, I don't recognize them." Jerome said.

"I imagined you wouldn't. They're SPARTAN-III's, the next generation of SPARTAN super-soldiers."

"SPARTAN-III's, I never heard of them." Alice said.

"it's considered top secret by ONI; it was intended that they would create disposable soldiers trained in teams of 300 to be thrown en masse against the Covenant to buy time for humanity. Hell, Gamma team, consisting of 335 SPARTAN-III's was completely wiped out in a pyrrhic victory. Beta and Alpha company, together numbering 300, suffered a similar fate." Jorge said extremely casually. That shocked the three SPARTAN's. over 600 SPARTAN's were wasted like that.

"so how come their still alive?" Douglas asked.

"command saw something in each of them, something too valuable to be wasted. So they pulled 'em out and turned 'em into Noble Team, a fire-sized squad designed to handle just about any situation we find."

"I would imagine that the SPARTAN-III's don't wear MJOLNIR."

"nope, they wear SPI, semi-powered infiltration armor. It's much more weak then MJOLNIR armor. Think of an ODST battle suit. Jack it up with very limited energy shielding and only 15 minutes of breathable air. That's what SPI is."

"so why are these III's wearing MJOLNIR? And why are all you SPARTAN's wearing really advanced MJOLNIR, what class is it?"  
>"Mark Seven MJOLNIR armor. Dr. Brown helped built them, they're probably the most devastating pieces of combat material we have at the moment." Jorge said.<p>

"one more question, you sound like you know so much about the III's." Alice said.

"they told me themselves." Jorge replied. He then stood up and picked up his M247 HMG, walking away. The gunboat continued upriver until they found a heavily damaged bridge defended by UNSC Army Troopers battling against a numerically-superior Covenant battalion.

"you see that?" Nikolai asked.

"it's beautiful." Dempsey said.

"what are you talking about?" Reznov asked.

"you remember that last bit of acid I was saving?" Dempsey asked.

"fucking A." Reznov said. Dempsey just swallowed the last of his LSD, that's why he thought the destruction of the bridge was 'beautiful.'

"I'm getting out, gonna see the situation. keep the boat here, but if I'm not back in 5 hours, leave without me." John said, grabbing Cortana. He hopped out of the boat and ran through the gunfire, plasma fire, and exploding mortars. One mortar got too close for comfort and flung the SPARTAN into a trench where it was lightly defended by several Trooper rifle men armed with DMR's and one M247 machine gun. You could definitely tell the gunner had been driven insane by the constant fighting.

"YEAH, YOU LIKE THAT YOU COVENANT BASTARD, HERE! HAVE SOME MORE! COME ON, YOU WANNA DESTROY THIS BRIDGE, WE GOT PLENTY OF BULLETS FOR YOU!" he screamed, firing his machine gun wildly.

"soldier, who's in charge here?" John interrupted.

"ain't you?" the soldier yelled.

"alright, gimme a sitrep!" John yelled, firing his assault rifle.

"we've been stationed here for over 3 months, Covenant keep blowing up the bridge every chance they get!" the marine replied. _they've been here for 3 months, how long have we been out there?_ John thought to himself.

"you got any grenades, mortars?"  
>"ran out of that stuff 5 weeks ago, sir!"<p>

"shit. Alright, you stay here, I'll take care of it." John said, hopping over the trench line, running back to the boat.

"I want mortars and machine guns everywhere in all directions! Don't stop firing until everyone's dead!" John yelled. As the mortars and bullets began flying,

"shouldn't we help them?" Anders asked.

"all these Troopers are already dead, they just don't know it yet. I'm just helping 'em out." John said.

"they're all dead, let's keep moving." Reznov slowly said, taking his position on the rear mini-gun. No one knew it, but this would be the beginning of the 141 losing their sanity. The gunboat continued moving forward, ignoring the sounds of spare rounds going off. They kept moving forward and found themselves under attack by Covenant grunts and jackals.

"kill 'em all!" Foley yelled. The gunfire was horrendous, the aliens were torn to shreds.

"we're not outta this yet. I can guarantee you it's gonna get more hot." John sighed. The boat continued up river, but they never made any contact with anyone.

"jeez, is anyone out there?" Carter asked.

"they're probably dead. Hey Chief, you think they're all dead?" Emile asked.

"maybe, but if I didn't run out of Nova 6 and I sprayed it all over the place, nothing would survive!" John cackled evilly. That little reminder of his terrible gas weapon put everyone on edge. And the men and women from the Spirit of Fire noticed it as well. They didn't bother asking anyone about his Nova 6 weapon; judging from their body language, they didn't want to discuss the weapon. The next day wasn't any better. The temperature rose up even more.

"jeez, how hot is it?" Anders asked, using her jacket to fan herself.

"what, you getting hot, take the fucking jacket off!" Shepherd replied, taking his jacket and shirt off. Anders was surprised at how well-toned the general was. Despite his age and elderly appearance, he looked as strong as the average UNSC Marine. Almost everyone removed their upper uniforms and gear. The SPARTAN's didn't. As the gunboat continued up the river,

"hey SPARTAN, do you mind if we stop here, I'd like to take some notes about this installation." Anders asked the Chief.

"I'm not stopping until I find Figursky and kill him. After that, we can stay as long as you want." John said. Anders was shut down. And seeing as he was driving the boat, he wasn't gonna stop anytime soon. For over the next several days, they made no contact with anyone, human or Covenant. The temperature kept rising, and the 141's sanity kept falling. One instance was when Kat saw what appeared to be a cow on a small ledge. She picked up an RPG-7 launcher, took aim, and squeezed the trigger. The result was a blood-and-gore fest. Kat just laughed at the sight of the animal being blown to pieces. The 141 didn't mind, but everyone else could only wonder how anyone could enjoy killing animals so much. John now spent his spare time looking over Figursky's file and smoking stogies nonstop. They reached what appeared to be a Forerunner version of a dock, and there were plenty of Warthogs lying around.

"let's see where this goes." John said, pointing down the road. Everyone hopped off the gunboat and climbed on the Warthogs. They had no idea where they were going, but they just wanted to get somewhere. They continued driving and found themselves leaving the fields and entered another Forerunner building, this one looked more like an apartment complex with the parking garage on top.

"alright, let's stop here, take a look and see what's in here." John said. Everyone readied their weapons and slowly walked inside. They found themselves at a large Forerunner door with a holo-pad in the front. Woods slapped his hand on the pad and the door opened up.

"how'd you do that?" Anders asked. Woods didn't answer. The squad continued moving forward and they found themselves in a massive, empty room. Problem was, it was rather dark. Very dark. Not even flashlights could work.

"nice one, Chief, you led us into a dark and dreary room." Nikolai sarcastically said.

"shut the fuck up, Nikky." John snarled. Suddenly, they heard a loud screeching sound. The 141 knew what that was.

"what the hell was that?" Forge asked.

"aw hell, not those bastards." Foley, Roebuck, and Kennedy groaned.

"we've had plenty of experience with that, actually. Dempsey, Richtofen, Nikolai, Takeo; since you four are our zombie-slaying experts, you four can tell us where a safe place for us is when we make our stand." John said.

"easy, someplace not here." Dempsey said.

"alright, you can take point. Just get us somewhere safe where we can make our stand." John said.

"alright." Dempsey said. They left the room and found a different door. They didn't know it, but it was another slipspace portal that led them somewhere else. They opened the door and walked the path. Hours seemed to pass for them, but they had no idea how long they were stuck there. They soon arrived at a large, swamp-like setting like it was in Japan during World War II. John thought it looked a lot like Shi No Numa.

"we're here, this is the place." Dempsey sighed.

"finally. I was getting tired of Ander's endless rambling about this place." Nikolai sighed.

"shut up Nikolai, and get your gear ready." Dempsey grumbled.

"here, we're making our stand against zombies here?" Forge asked in disbelief.

"hey, you may not think zombies are real, but you'll shit your pants and think twice when they come. Which is right now." John said, firing his assault rifle at a grunt zombie. Undead Covenant and human began pouring in at all sides. Everyone besides the task force 141 was scared shitless. The 141 just kept on killing because this was all they knew what to do, especially when it came to zombies.

"this is where the fun begins." Shepherd coldly.

"you got that right, general." Jorge grumbled, cocking his machine gun. Bullets and rockets immediately began flying, destroying the zombies. The crew from the Spirit of Fire had to fight for their lives; they never faced an enemy like this.

"eat it, maggot-sacks!" Dempsey hollered, firing his B.A.R into a Jackal zombie.

"hey Jacob Keyes, this is Richtofen, we could use some DG weapons at the moment!" the Nazi yelled.

"just wait a minute, I need to get a fix on your location."

"WE DON'T HAVE A FUCKING MINUTE!" John screamed. Even though the zombies were no match for the human and single Elite soldiers, they just poured in endless numbers.

"stay the fuck away from my vodka!" Nikolai yelled, slashing a human zombie who tried to grab his alcohol.

"come on, you undead fuckers, I saved up plenty for you!" Kat yelled, laughing as she unloaded her MA37 into a pack of human zombies. Human, Covenant, whatever, she actually enjoyed slaughtering zombies, despite that she was tired of the endless war. If you had to identify the top three soldiers who enjoyed slaughtering zombies the most, it would be Dempsey, Richtofen, and Kat. Drop pods containing rocket launchers flew down, but no DG weapons.

"how many of these things are there?" Forge yelled, firing her MA5B.

"I don't know!" John snarled.

"you don't know?" Jerome asked, horrified.

"yup! Ain't war hell?" John insanely laughed. Red Team looked at him like he was crazy. After hours of endless fighting, the DG weapons finally arrived.

"what the hell is this?" Forge asked. Richtofen snatched the rifle out of his hands.

"THE WUNDERWAFFE DG-2, HOW WUNDERBAR!" Richtofen screamed as he fired the strange-looking weapon. Lighting shot out and electrocuted whatever it touched, spreading like a cancer. Everyone except the 141 was surprised to see that weapon. Explosions seemed to be everywhere.

"how do you guys acquire all these rockets and grenades?" Forge yelled.

"do the math!" Jun yelled, blowing a zombie's head off with his rifle. After five more hours of slaying zombies, the battle was finally over.

"okay, let's get the hell back to the boat. Wherever it is." Hudson sighed, reloading his rifle.

"hey man, you think this place has teleporters, like that Halo ring we went to?" Bowman asked.

"probably, if it's Forerunner." Castro said, lighting another cigar after reloading his AK-47 rifle. John took a chance as him being labeled a Reclaimer and assumed that this whole room was some massive teleporter.

"gunboat, now!" he yelled. Everyone found themselves back at the dock where they left their boat.

"huh. Guess that solved the boat problem." Veronica said.

"what about all those Warthogs?" Alice asked.

"meh, we got plenty of 'em, we lost a bunch of UNSC equipment before, never hurt the one-four-one." John said, taking the wheel. Everyone piled onboard the gunboat and they continued heading up north.

"alright, let's keep going. Is it me, or is it getting hotter?" John asked.

"it's not you." Carter sighed, wiping his brow. John sighed and furiously wiped his brow; the temperature was getting hotter and hotter. Several more days up the river, the 141 began to get more cranky and on edge; a sign of their degrading mentality, they were slowly going insane. _This mission just keeps getting harder and harder. It's bad enough we have Professor Anders and the guys from the Spirit of Fire with us, now we have to content with fucking zombies, this is just fucking great._ John thought to himself as he read Figursky's file yet again.

"hey SPARTAN, you notice something?" Forge asked one day.

"yeah?"  
>"the farther we go upriver, the hotter it gets and these guys lose more of their clothes. I mean, some of the guys are just wearing their boots and pants."<p>

"I don't blame 'em, it is getting really hot. Hey, you notice those two SPARTAN's over there?" Alice asked, motioning to Carter and Kat.

"yeah, what about 'em?"  
>"they seem really close, don't you think?"<p>

"yeah, so?" Forge asked.

"never mind." Alice muttered, walking away. Se was trying to get to the fact that the 141-SPARTAN's had their sex drive back, but none of the other SPARTAN's were experiencing it. Yet, that is. As they continued to travel upriver, the temperature grew hotter and hotter. There was one thing that everyone couldn't put off; the 141 seemed to grow more mentally unstable with every passing day. One such incident really sparked a turn. The gunboat came across a primitive sampan carrying what appeared to be a human family, Figursky probably had refugees with him.

"stop the boat, let's see who they are." Jorge said, readying his machine gun.

"they're refugees, can't you see that?" Anders said.

"maybe, but I'd like to be sure." Romeo said, readying his sniper rifle.

"Foley, get in the sampan, see what's in there." John ordered. Problem was, the family spoke Asian, Foley didn't. The Asian family wanted Foley to leave, but Foley tried to calm them down. It didn't work.

"okay, fuck it. Shoot 'em." John ordered. Foley jumped in the water to avoid the gunshots. The family was soon riddled with bullets. Foley got back onboard and checked the sampan.

"no weapons, just food and supplies." he said extremely casually.

"we still got a live one." Carter pointed out. John pulled out his Magnum and fired five bullets into the wounded man.

"we don't stop moving for any reason. Let's keep going." John said very coldly. Night soon fell. Once again, John was left alone with his thoughts. Cortana joined him, however.

"how you doing?" Cortana asked.

"I just keep wondering. What would Halsey, Mendez, and the rest of the II's would think of me if they saw all that."

"you did what you had to do to finish the mission, John. I don't blame you. If I were in your boots, I'd do the same thing." Cortana re-assured the soldier. John smiled. Cortana was the only one that really knew him and understood what he was going through.

"get some rest, Chief, you're gonna need it for tomorrow. You've already gone through Figursky's file, there isn't anymore to read."

John followed Cortana's advice and went below to catch some well deserved sleep. The next morning, however, they found themselves under attack by an unknown enemy.

"alright, shoot 'em! Now!" John yelled. The waves of mortars and gunfire was staggering; their attackers were torn to shreds. But that small brief skirmish helped degrade their minds and drove them further into insanity, slowly destroying their humanity.

"hey John, can we stop for a moment, I wanna go in the forest and bring back some real meat." Kat said with a sinister grin.

"make it quick." John said, pulling the boat over to the shore.

"Jun, you're coming with me." Kat said.

"oh boy." the sniper muttered.

"I can only imagine what's gonna happen." Roebuck muttered. Almost immediately, a loud growl was heard, followed by laughter and a shriek. Couple of minutes later, Jun came running back into the boat, breathing heavily.

"Jun, where's Kat?" Carter asked. Carter soon got his answer. Kat came walking back with a large tiger on her shoulders. Blood was guzzling down her armor and she wore a very sadistic smile on her face. It was clear she killed it with her knife and not her assault rifle.

"I'm never getting off the boat, not ever again." Jun sighed.

"oh, you're just a big baby is all." Kat chuckled. _Never get off the boat. That's damn good advice. Except if you're Figursky. If you're like Colonel Figursky, one foot off the boat and you'll end up bat-shit crazy. Wonder if Kat's gonna end up like that, I hope she never does. She along with Emile, Ghost, Dempsey, Shepherd, Richtofen, and me are probably the most unstable soldiers in the squad when it comes to fighting. Hell, come down to it, it probably boils down to Richtofen, me, and Kat. How the hell did Figursky get this far down the line? What did he see during the war, I saw the same things, so how come I'm not like him? _John thought to himself as he observed Kat skin the tiger with her knife. Forge couldn't believe what he was witnessing. SPARTAN's were supposed to be the most disciplined soldiers out there. But the actions he was seeing now suggested totally otherwise. Jerome, Alice, and Douglas wanted to know more about the III's, they never knew that another program was created. That meant that they were technically obsolete. They put that thought out of their minds and headed below deck. The next morning, Forge and Anders were busy discussing whether Noble would shape up or stay crazy.

"they can't remain this way forever." Anders said.

They walked up the stairs to the top deck, but everyone immediately stopped right in their tracks with their eyes wide open.

"or maybe they can." Forge said. Anders was blushing; she couldn't believe what she was seeing. Every member of the Task Force 141 was naked; 100% naked. And they were all sweating like crazy, that's how hot it was.

"you know, before this, I could never imagine a SPARTAN naked. Until now, that is." Halsey said. They slowly made their way onto the top deck, very surprised by what they saw.

"hey Brown, check this out!" a naked John-117 yelled. His ribs then began moving up and out, creating a wing-like effect on his torso. It disgusted everyone when they saw that.

"pretty cool, huh, I figured it out just a minute ago with the mechanical implants you gave me! You know, the ones you put in my after my real ribs were broken by that brute chieftain!"

"you're not supposed to do that, you'll end up paralyzing yourself or killing yourself." Brown said, sticking some medical tool in John's spinal cord. After a couple of minutes, John couldn't move his ribs anymore.

"hey check it out, civvies." Dunn said. John look to his left and saw a group of refugees walking down the shoreline. Grabbing a sniper rifle, John expertly picked off the civilians one by one. He even went so far as to blow away a 6-year old boy. That left one helluva mess. As the boat continued up north,

"hey John, do you think maybe you and everyone else could change into something more…..um…appropriate?" Alice asked.

"maybe, but it's one hundred fucking degrees out here, I ain't going back in my armor until it gets more cool." John said, not caring that he swore so freely in front of a fellow SPARTAN. As they continued up river, the 141 went more and more insane. Seconds turned into minutes. Minutes turned into hours. Hours turned into days. Everyone simply waited for the showdown between them and Figursky. _It doesn't really matter. I guess the thing that scares me the most is that I honestly don't give a damn what everyone thinks of me when I kill Figursky. I m a soldier, I get an order, I follow it. It's that fucking simple. _John thought as he tossed his last cigarette butt into the what seemed like forever, the gunboat finally arrived at Figurskys compound. And it was covered in severed heads, human and Covenant. And there were dozens of ODST's and Troopers standing guard, all of them in a catatonic state. As the gunboat pulled up,

"you guys stay here. I'll find Figursky and find out what's wrong with him. If I'm not back in fifteen hours, get back to the ship and have the captain bomb this place until nothing is left." John said, pulling on a T-shirt, a pair of shorts and his boots.

"wait. Here, put this on." Woods said, slapping something on John's chest before the T-shirt went on.

"what is it?"

"flesh colored wire, it'll pick up whatever anyone says to you. It's so we can hear what Figursky has to say to you."

Before leaving the boat, John grabbed Carter, walked him to the rear and whispered something to him. The others couldn't hear. John then hopped off the boat and began walking up to the compound. Carter took the wheel and drove the boat away.

"wait, what are you doing?" Anders asked.

"John wants us to leave him, says he's gonna spend some 'quality time' with the colonel. He also said to be back in a couple of days." Carter said.

"and what the hell are we gonna do for two days while John gets to know the colonel?" Dempsey asked.

"there's still plenty of Covenant around. That oughta keep us busy." Carter said nonchalantly. At the compound, John was taken by the rogue soldiers, and for some odd reason he didn't understand, he was thrown on the ground and dragged through the mud. John knew better then to fight them, because they had BR55 battle rifles and M7 submachine guns pointed at his head. After that, they threw the super-soldier into a large bamboo cage. An ODST that had several old-fashioned cameras from the 1960's around his neck walked up. From the look of his face, he was definitely insane.

"hey, could I talk to the colonel?" John asked.

"hey, man, you don't talk to the colonel. You listen to him. The man's enlarged my mind. He's a poet warrior in the classic sense. I mean sometimes he'll... uh... well, you'll say "hello" to him, right? And he'll just walk right by you. He won't even notice you. And suddenly he'll grab you, and he'll throw you in a corner, and he'll say, "do you know that 'if' is the middle word in life? If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs and blaming it on you, if you can trust yourself when all men doubt you"... I mean I'm... no, I can't... I'm a little man, I'm a little man, he's... he's a great man! I should have been a pair of ragged claws scuttling across floors of silent seas…" the photojournalist, as John called him, ranted.

"are you alright, mister?" John asked.

"me.. I'm perfectly sane, man." the ODST replied.

"can't I just talk to the colonel?" John asked.

"hey, you see all those severed heads, man? Sometimes, he goes too far, man. And he's the first one to admit, man. Oh man, you have to see Figursky in the light, man. In the light, man! Man…. I wish I had words, man. I wish I had words... I can tell you something… like the other day he wanted to kill me. Something like that." the journalist said.

"why did he want to kill you?" John slowly said.

"because I took his picture. He said, 'If you ever take my picture again, I'll fucking kill you.' and he meant it man, every word. The man is clear in his mind, but he is mad, man. Totally mad. His soul, man, is mad."

John began to wonder if everyone under Figursky's command was really insane.

"look, I just wanna talk to him, okay? Those are my orders." John calmly said.

"orders? Yeah right! You're probably gonna kill him, man! Why? Why would a nice guy like you want to kill a genius? Feeling pretty fucking good, huh? Why? Do you know that the man really likes you? He likes you. He really likes you. But he's got something in mind for you. Aren't you curious about that? I'm curious. I'm very curious. He said, "the first person to come on my shore with the intent to kill me, put him in the cage and keep him alive. "Aren't you curious? There's something happening out here, man. You know something, man? I know something that you don't know. That's right, Jack. The man is clear in his mind, but his soul is mad. Oh, yeah. He's dying, I think. He hates all this. He hates it! But the man's a... he reads poetry out loud, all right. And a voice... he likes you because you're still alive. He's got plans for you. No, I'm not gonna help you. You're gonna help him, man. You're gonna help him. I mean, what are they gonna say when he's gone? Cause he dies when **it** dies, when **it** dies, he dies! What are they gonna say about him? That he was a kind man? That he was a wise man? That he had plans? That he had wisdom? Bullshit, man! And am I gonna be the one that's gonna set them straight? Look at me! Look at me! Wrong! You! You're gonna set 'em straight, man! Set it straight, man! Listen. He's brilliant, man."

John wondered if this man was suffering from schizophrenia.

"yeah, brilliant enough to steal a UNSC frigate and make it in this planet. Me, I would've bombed him off the face of the earth if my ship wasn't destroyed." John sarcastically lied.

"that's the way the fucking world ends! Look at this fucking shit we're in, man! Not with a bang, but with a whimper! A whimper, man!"

"can I talk to the fucking colonel, or not?" John angrily asked.

"oh, I see. Okay, uh, well, I'll go talk to the colonel and see if he wants to see you, man. By the way, man, what's your name?"

Against his better judgment,

"my name is John-117, I'm a SPARTAN-II super soldier." John replied.

"far out, man. Far out." the journalist said, giving John the 'peace' symbol and walking away in a crazed state. John simply sat down on the dirt and began forming a plan how to kill Colonel Carl Figursky.

"hope you guys heard all that." John whispered to himself, hoping the squad back at the boat heard what just happened here. Later that night, the bamboo cage opened up and the journalist was back.

"he's wants to see you, man. This is fucking amazing, man, amazing." the crazed ODST said. John got to his feet and followed the rogue Army Troopers inside the large Forerunner temple Figursky turned into his base of operations. John found that it was only lit by torch light and candles, no modern electricity at all. John followed the soldiers deep inside the compound where he found Figursky, sitting in a corner where the light barely hit him.

"Colonel Carl Frederick Figursky?" John asked, sitting down.

"did they say why, SPARTAN super soldier John-117, why they want to terminate my command?" Figursky asked.  
>"I was sent on a classified mission, sir." John replied.<br>"It's no longer classified, is it? Did they tell you?" Figursky replied.

"they told me that you had gone totally insane, and that your methods were unsound." John replied forcefully.  
>"are my methods unsound?"<br>"I don't see any method at all, sir."  
>"I expected someone like you. What did you expect? Are you an assassin?"<br>"I'm a soldier."

"you're neither. You're an errand boy, sent by grocery clerks, to collect a bill." Figursky replied grimly.

"I know nothing of the sort. I all know is that the things you've done are rather… horrifying, to say the least."

"I've seen horrors... horrors that you've seen. But you have no right to call me a murderer. You have a right to kill me. You have a right to do that... but you have no right to judge me. It's impossible for words to describe what is necessary to those who do not know what horror means. Horror... horror has a face... and you must make a friend of horror. Horror and moral terror are your friends. If they are not, then they are enemies to be feared. They are truly enemies. I remember back in '47... seems a thousand centuries ago. I ordered my men down in Arcadia to secure a little town. We found a nursery destroyed by the Covenant. And there they were, toddlers and babies… innocent little children who had no part in this war. There they were in a pile. A pile of dead, lifeless, children. And I remember... I cried, I wept like some grandmother. I wanted to tear my teeth out; I didn't know what I wanted to do. And I want to remember it. I never want to forget it... I never want to forget. And then I realized... like I was shot... like I was shot with a diamond... a diamond bullet right through my forehead. And I thought, my God... the genius of that! The genius! The will to do that! Perfect, genuine, complete, crystalline, pure. And then I realized they were stronger than us, because they could stand that they were not monsters, they were soldiers... trained killing machines. These aliens who fought with their hearts, who had families, who had children, who were filled with love... but they had the strength... the strength... to do that. If I had over 10,000 divisions of those aliens, those Elites, our troubles here would be over very quickly. You have to have men who are moral... and at the same time who are able to utilize their primordial instincts to kill without feeling... without passion... without judgment... without judgment! Because it's judgment that defeats us." Figursky said. Having heard enough, John got up and walked away.

"the SPARTAN's are extinct, soldier!" Figursky yelled, stopping John.

"what?" John asked, turning around.

"the SPARTAN super-soldier is extinct. It was a failed experiment; why do you think we don't have any more super-soldiers in the field? Is it because it's too expensive? No. Is it because it takes too long? No. it's because it's a failed experiment. We're not gonna make anymore because to do so would be pointless. Remember that, John-117, remember that you're a failed experiment, one that should never be attempted again." Figursky said.

"the UNSC doesn't have the means or time to create more soldiers at the moment. But once this war is over-"

"the UNSC are a bunch of hypocritical thugs. We train young men to drop fire on people, but their commanders won't allow them to write 'fuck' on their airplanes because it's obscene!" Figursky chuckled. John heard enough. He pushed past the guards and headed to the shoreline. Sitting down, he whispered into the wire,

"hey guys, you can come back now." John muttered. The boat came back 5 hours later, with plasma scorch marks all over the hull. John guessed the shielding failed.

"we heard everything. He and his friends are crazy." Bowman said.

"I'll kill him tonight." John said. That night, Figurskys men held some sort of a luau party. On the boat, John was getting ready. He put camouflage war paint from the Vietnam era on his face. He also wore Vietnam era GI gear and was armed with an M4A1 carbine assault rifle.

"you're gonna do this?" Miller asked. He wasn't so sure if John would carry out the mission.

"fuck yeah I'm gonna do it. If I'm not back in five hours, get back to the ship and have the Captain bomb this place." John said. He slowly crawled over the side of the boat and waded into the water. No one noticed the ripples, they were too busy with the party. Everyone on the boat, however, was interested on how John was gonna take care of Figursky. As the rogue ODST's and Troopers continued their party, John slowly snuck in from behind and disappeared into the compound.

"how long do you think he'll take to find the Colonel?" Carter asked.

"I'll give him 16 hours." Foley sighed.

"I'll give him five hours." Polonsky said.

"I'll give him two. If he's not back by then, we'll have Captain Keyes bomb the area." Carter muttered, giving the order to have everyone on the boat gun down all the rogue soldiers. Red Team was a shocked senseless; these soldiers didn't really have any faith in John finishing his mission. That, and Carter just brutally killed a bunch of rogue soldiers with no regret or remorse. Everyone decided to wait, they wanted to see if John was still alive. Morning soon came, and seeing that John wasn't here, Anders decided to take pictures of the facility, despite the fact that it was now covered with dead human soldiers. As Anders climbed back onboard the gunboat, they heard a loud hoarse voice that had a hint of sarcasm.

"HEY ANDERS! HOW 'BOUT ONE FOR THE PHOTO ALBUM?"

It was John, he had returned from his mission. He held something in his right arm, thought they didn't know what it was. He held his rifle in his left. He casually tossed the unidentified object in the boat. It hit with a metallic 'thud'. Anders screamed once she saw what it was: Col. Figursky's head with the spinal cord still attached.

"how the hell'd he do it?" Dempsey asked.

"easy, I ripped his head off while keeping the spinal cord intact. I got it for you, Richtofen. I know you like this crazy shit." John honestly said as he got back on the boat. He was covered in blood and his eyes shone of murderous insanity. In his current state of mind, no one dared mess with him. As he got back on the wheel, Anders, Forge, and Red Team took one good look at his face and were scared shitless. Nothing but insanity shone in his eyes; whatever was left of his humanity was destroyed in him assassinated Figursky. The boat ride was silent on the way back. But when they got around the middle of the river, everyone started chatting again. At least everyone put their clothes back on, that was a relief for everyone. Halfway down the river, however,

"I'm reading a lot of Covenant activity up the road, boss." Jun said.

"alright, let's take 'em. Bowman, Woods, M202's on the starboard and port. Dutch, Richtofen, SPARTAN lasers. Mickey, Makarov, use the M41's, hit whatever you see. Everyone get to the turrets and gun positions, this is gonna be hot." John ordered.

"let's see what they think of this." Woods said, turning the radio on. _Sympathy for the Devil _by _The Rolling Stones _went on the radio. John opened the throttle and the gunboat roared through the waters, gunfire, rockets, and grunge music blasting away from the boat. Everyone save for the 141 thought that the music was distracting. After several minutes of fighting, they were home free. When they got to the base where Shepherd rode the waves, Forge mentioned something to Red Team.

"you know, I noticed something. When started down here, everyone was just their regular selves. But as we head up north, everyone started losing their sanity. When we got up to the compound, everyone had just insane. Also the temperature got higher. When we headed down, the temperature got lower and everyone started regaining their sanity again."

"what are you saying?" Douglas asked in a dangerous tone. Forge didn't get to finish because they got a new message from Cpt. Keyes.

"Master Chief, this is captain Keyes, was the mission a success?"

"Figursky's as good as dead. What's up?" the SPARTAN asked, putting the last of his armor back on.

"get your men back onboard. Now that Figursky's dead, we can leave this system and get the hell back to Earth." Keyes said.

"best good news I've heard all day." John said. The squad climbed back onboard their helicopters, leaving the gunboat behind, and flew back up to the Morning Sun. They noticed two wreckages of two Covenant super carriers the Morning Sun engaged earlier.

"wow. That's one helluva ship you guys got." Forge said.

"she's a beauty." Brown said. Some wondered if he had swallowed acid as well; the Morning Sun was covered in scorch marks and holes from 29 years of war. It obviously didn't look beautiful, not to normal beauty standards.

"Captain Keyes, what are our new orders?" Carter asked.

"get onboard so we can get the fuck home." Keyes said. That was good news for everyone. Once they boarded the UNSC super carrier,

"alright. Let's go home." Keyes said. The slipspace drive activated and the massive warship slowly roared into the massive anomaly.

"how long until we reach Earth?" Cutter asked.

"because our slipspace drive and our navigational systems suffered heavy damage, we honestly don't know. It could be hours, weeks, or even months. Just hold on tight, captain, we'll get you and your crew home. I promise you that." Keyes said. Brown was busy rechecking the calculations on the slipstream drive.

"that can't be right." he muttered.

"what's going on?" Cutter asked, leaning over Brown.

"aw shit, the element 115 tapped into the slipstream drive and the PFC! And I can't drive it out!"

"stop it!" Keyes yelled.

"what the hell do you think I'm doing, playing solitaire?" Brown yelled back, quickly setting up multiple roadblocks and doing whatever he could to prevent the element 115 from accessing the PFC and the main engine. But all his efforts were for naught.

"SON OF A BITCH!" Brown screamed as the PFC activated. The slipspace realm around the two ships changed dimension and dragged the two ships away.

February 4th, 2553

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

UNSC Spirit of Fire

Onyx Shield World

"where are we, Cortana?" Keyes asked.

"let me get a bearing. Looks like we're at Onyx." Cortana said.

"so where is it?" Carter asked. All they saw was a massive black sphere.

"that is Onyx. Or the remains of it. I'm reading a massive energy source emanating from the sphere, looks like it's Forerunner." Cortana said very casually. Noble Team, minus Jorge, stared at her in shock. They had trained on Onyx; they thought it was just another planet. But now they were being told it was a giant Forerunner sphere.

"are you telling us Onyx is actually some Forerunner weapon?" Jun asked.

"more around the lines of a bomb shelter, if I'm reading this right."

"wait a minute. I'm reading multiple weapon signatures. One appears to be a FENRIS nuclear warhead. The other two appear to be Covenant plasma weaponry, and the last one is Forerunner. More than likely Sentinels." Brown said. John swore. He learned long ago that Sentinels weren't to be trusted likely. Unfortunately, he made the same stupid mistake of trusting 343 Guilty Spark. He, the Arbiter, Dempsey, Nikolai, Takeo and Richtofen almost paid for his shortsightedness with their lives.

"are they a threat?" John asked.

"that don't matter. Get us the fuck home, right now." Keyes said, his previously calm manner now changing to a rather angry tone.

"sir?" he asked.

"we still got a war to fight. So let's get the fuck home and finish it. Then we can come back here and tinker around all we want." Keyes said very angrily.

"okay then. Helmsmen, plot a course for Earth. As fast as humanly possible." Carter ordered.

"Richtofen, can we channel more 115 into the engines, make us go faster?" Keyes asked.

"never tried that before."

"will it make us go faster?"  
>"I believe so. Why do you ask?"<p>

"I'm tired of all these pit stops, we're going home right now."

"well, we can channel the 115 into the engines. We can even modify the slipspace field via the slipspace engine to account for both ships. Keep in mind though that all that element 115 will cause the field to experience some… anomalies."

"don't care, just get us home right now."

"roger that." Brown said, typing in the commands. The slipspace field opened up, pulling the massive warship inside. Once fully inside, the field closed, leaving behind a rather large residual of Element 115. An ONI corvette flew by, catching the attention of the residue, unnoticed to the vessels' occupants, save one, however.

February 4th, 2553

UNSC Port Stanley

Onyx Shield World

"hmm. That's curious. Why didn't we spot that earlier?" BB asked himself.

"spot what, BB?" Captain Serin Osman asked as she entered the bridge.

"I'm now reading a very odd energy signature emanating from the bottom of the ship. The strange thing is that I didn't detect it when we first arrived." BB said, slightly confused.

"you think it may have come from this shield world?" Osman asked.

"I've been scanning the world dozens, if not hundreds of times over. If there was something, I would've caught it before." BB said with an air of clear superiority.

"is this energy signature dangerous to the ship or the crew?" Osman asked.

"until I get more information, I can't accurately- we got an emergency on our hands." BB said rather fast.

"what's wrong?"  
>"the unidentified energy signature, it's moving toward us." BB said in awe.<p>

"wow, I think this is the first time you've been caught dumbstruck, BB. Do you need to run a self-diagnostic?" Captain Osman asked jokingly.

"I'm not joking, that thing's actually moving toward the ship. I don't know what'll happen if, no, _when_ it makes contact, but I think we shouldn't test that out."

"then polarize the armor plating. Let's see if we can't make ourselves invisible to that, whatever it is."

"it's not working, it's now within the ship and traveling through the hull! It's moving right through the metal! What is this thing?" BB asked, very shocked at what the Element 115 was capable of.

"where's it going?" Osman asked, now very concerned.

"it's heading toward the slipspace reactor! It's making contact, it's now inside our drive! Shit, it's activating the drive!" BB exclaimed.

"can you turn the drive off, disconnect it?"

"it's too late for that!" BB yelled. The slipspace drive turned on, taking the corvette on the same path as the UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun. Their path was so accurate, so close to the original co-ordinates, that the Port Stanley actually merged inside the slipspace field of the previously-stated vessel. They weren't able to catch up, however. The Morning Sun had a much longer head-start, and the Element 115 that was being pushed into the engines caused it to increase the distance between them.

"is that a ship in the field?" Osman asked.

"getting a reading now… yes, it's a ship. Has the weight and dimensions of a UNSC supercarrier. But at this distance, I'm not able to get an exact reading on the ship. We are within communications range, however."

"let's contact them. Do we have comms?"  
>"we do."<p>

"unidentified UNSC supercarrier, this is Captain Serin Osman of the UNSC Port Stanley, Office of Naval Intelligence. Please respond." what they received startled them. What they heard was gunfire, growling, screaming, howling, and shrieking.

"HERE! HAVE SOME GRENADES AND HAVE A NICE DAY!" Nikolai Belinsky screamed.

"WHERE DID ALL THESE FUCKING ZOMBIES COME FROM?" Carter yelled.

"HELL IF I KNOW, BUT THESE BASTARDS ARE ALL OVER THE PLACE! MY GUESS IS THE MORGUE! RICHTOFEN, THIS IS YOUR FAULT!" Foley yelled.

"YEAH, BLAME THE GERMAN, YOU STUPID AMERICAN!" the Nazi yelled back.

"YOU'RE THE ONE WHO PRACTICES NECROPHILIA, AND YOU DO KNOW HOW TO BRING BACK THE DEAD!" Emile yelled.

"I'M ALL OUT OF VODKA! HELP! What does the clicking noise mean?" Nikolai asked, referring to his empty gun.

"Richtofen, did you bring down the shielding in the morgue?" John asked.

"um….."

"DID YOU BRING DOWN THE SHIELDING IN THE MORGUE?" John bellowed.

"YES, I DID!" Richtofen yelled, laughing insanely.

"I'm all out of vodka. What to do. Think, Nikolai. Think. I got it. I GOT NO VODKA! HELP! Also my gun is making a clicking noise, it's very annoying. But more importantly, I HAVE NO VODKA!"

The comms cut off, leaving everyone on the Port Stanley wondering what the hell did they just hear.

"BB, analyze what we just heard. And correct me if I'm wrong, which I hope I am, but did we just hear some soldiers fighting zombies on that ship?" Osman asked slowly.

"I don't know. I honestly don't know." BB said, astounded as well.

"alright, keep the comms open. Let's see if we can't talk to them. And bring the survivors up here, as well as the rest of Kilo-Five, they might need to hear this." Osman said. Hours passed and the bridge became more cramped. Once the static was over, they heard more talking from the ship. There was some noise in the background that sounded like bodies being dragged.

"…..how the hell am I supposed to know?" came the gravelly voice of John-117.

"well, you are a SPARTAN. You were raised from the age of six to be a soldier." Polonsky cut in.

"oh, so does that mean I'm an expert at killing?"  
>"aren't you?"<br>"yeah, I guess I am, but that doesn't mean I'm gonna go kill everyone I see. Well, I'd kill a man in a fair fight. Or if I think he's gonna start a fair fight. Or if it's just orders."

"like colonel Figursky? Nice job, by the way, ripping his head off."

"don't push me, Polonsky. Hell, looks like the captain wasn't exaggerating about losing half the crew. Dammit, can't that damn Nazi bastard keep the shield online, he knows how dangerous that stuff us, especially to dead bodies."

"wonder what Dr. Halsey would think of that."

"Halsey. Hell, Halsey's the bitch that ruined my life, condemned me to a life of a soldier." John laughed. His laugh and tone of voice suggested that he was simply kidding.

"hey guys, I'm all out of vodka. You got any to spare?" Nikolai asked.

"we figured that out a long time ago. And no, we don't have any."

"come on, chief, you must have a big pile of vodka hidden! You're a booze pounder, just like me! And cigarette smoker."

"I know that, Belinsky, I know. Speaking of which, has anyone seen my smokes and vodka?" John asked.

"you left 'em on one of the weapon crates, the one holding all the AK-47's." Polonsky said. They then heard the sound of a lighter being flicked and the faint sound of someone smoking.

"oh yeah, that hit the spot." John sighed deeply.

"can I have some of your vodka?"

"I got a six-pack, don't I?" John asked. The sound of bottles clinking was heard.

"ah, good stuff. You have good taste in vodka, my SPARTAN friend."

The comms then cut off. The crew and passengers of the Port Stanley had no idea what to make of what they just heard.

February 7th, 2553

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

UNSC Spirit of Fire

UNSC Port Stanley

Slipstream Realm

"how close are we?" Captain Keyes asked.

"we're getting close. Our estimation puts us right... Here, right in Earth's upper atmosphere." Brown concluded.

"can a ship of this size actually handle that?"

"she's strong and tough, I think she'll survive."

"alright, then. Prepare to exit." Keyes ordered.

A massive slipstream opening filled the space, burping out the UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun, the UNSC Spirit of Fire, and the UNSC Port Stanley. The first two ships never knew of the corvette that followed them. The Morning Sun was literally steaming as excess Element 115 energy was being vented out in an effort to save her systems.

"sir, I'm picking up a ONI corvette off our port stern." Dr. Brown reported.

"forget them, I'm not in the mood to talk to ONI at the moment."

"sir, I'm also picking up something over the comms." Lt. Dominique rang out.

"what is it, lieutenant?" Keyes sighed.

"it's Adm. Hood, sir. He's requesting the presence of the Task Force 141 down on the planet surface, sir." Dominique said a little confused.

"alright then, grant his request. I'll be in my quarters." Keyes sighed, slowly unbuttoning his jacket and stepping over a dead zombie. The crew from the Port Stanley heard that message as well and decided to head down there, wondering what Admiral Hood would want with this Task Force 141. Several Pelicans left the two warships and headed down to hills of Voi.

"wonder what Hood wants for us?" John asked.

"I don't know. But I'm pretty sure it's something important to require the presence of the entire task force." Cortana commented.

"I'm going helmetless for a moment, you mind?" John asked.

"go ahead." Cortana said. John removed his helmet to pop in another smoke. When all the Pelicans landed at a large hill near Voi,

"glad to see you're all in one piece." Hood said.

"glad to be pack, Admiral. So what'd you call us down here for?" John asked.

"that." Hood said, pointing behind John. John turned around and got a face-full of M41 rocket launcher. He fell backwards on the ground, making him drop his helmet. Before he lost all consciousness, however, he heard several words that revealed the 141's true intentions.

"do with him as you wish, Admiral. He's our gift to you, in honor of our new relationship. Just make sure that he suffers." Castro said haughtily.

"don't worry. Where we're gonna send him, he'll rediscover the meaning of pain." Hood said smugly. The Task Force 141 were smiling, knowing that Admiral Hood kept up his end of the bargain. Everyone else that came down from the Port Stanley were shocked and confused. Carter knelt down and pulled out Cortana's data-chip from John's helmet.

"everything went well, I take it?" Admiral Hood asked.

"smoothly, he never suspected a damn thing." Carter said.

"that's good, that's very good. You can come out, Captain Osman." Kilo-Five and the survivors, save Dr. Halsey and their prisoner Elite came out, all shocked and stunned by what they saw.

"what-what's going on here?" Fred asked.

"Sierra-117's under arrest for treason, conspiracy to commit treason, war crimes against humanity….. need I go on?" Hood asked, implying he had a lot more in his head.

"but, but-Admiral, this is John-117 we're talking about, there's no way he'd do any of that." Mendez protested.

"he did. I got plenty of proof, not on me at the moment, but I have it. Everyone here is now under strict orders not to mention to anyone what happened here, do you understand?" Hood asked.

"Adm. Parangosky won't stand for this." Osman began.

"that old hag can kiss my ass! She commands all of ONI, I command the entire fucking Navy! If she tries to interfere with me, I'll just bomb every ONI base and installation off the face of the Earth! And I'll do it, I swear I will do it. You don't wanna push me, captain." Hood said dangerously. A disturbance in front of the rocks was then spotted. It was Jul 'Mdama; he somehow escaped from his imprisonment from the Port Stanley. Gunfire raked the disturbance, bringing down his cloak.

"hello Jul." Thel said.

"Arbiter? I thought you were dead." Jul said slowly.

"well, I'm here, aren't I? So, did you follow my orders?" Thel asked.

"what orders?" Captain Osman asked.

"before I left to the Ark to kill Truth and destroy the Flood, I gave Jul 'Mdama orders to blockade the Brute's Homeworld. You didn't do it, did you?" Thel asked.

"Arbiter Thel Vadem, I am Jul 'Mdama, a member of the Servants of Abiding Truth."

"I'm guessing it has something to do with the Prophet of Truth, doesn't it? Wanting to restart the war, bring humanity to extinction?" Thel growled angrily. Jul looked a little stunned; how could he have known?

"I entrusted you to help bring security and order to our Homeworld, and you're probably off splitting our people into different sects." that wasn't a total lie.

"you failed me, Jul."

"oh yeah, what are you gonna do about it?" Jul asked, immediately regretting it, seeing as several Demons were backing the Arbiter up. Of course, he also witnessed these Demons betray one of their own, so he didn't know what would happen.

"did you know, Jul 'Mdama, that in certain older cultures here on Earth, that when men failed entirely at their appointed task, like you, that they threw themselves on their swords?" Thel said, walking toward the Task Force 141.

"well, that's too bad, because I didn't bring a sword." Jul said sarcastically. Thel unsheathed Takeo's Samurai Sword, holding it by the hilt, pointing the blade backwards.

"you, you don't know how to use that." Jul said nervously.

"try me." Thel growled. Jul tried to run, but the Arbiter was already on him. Slamming his fist into the Elites lower back, he then harshly twisted it, causing his nerve bundle to freeze up, freezing the Elite. Turning the traitor around so everyone could see, he planted Takeo's sword down on the ground, the blade pointing upwards. Jul had no trouble seeing the blade. He then realized, to his horror, that his body weight was slowly making him fall forward. He realized that there was absolutely no way he could save himself.

"oh, Commander?" Thel asked.

"yes?" Carter asked, mildly amused by the turn of events.

"this data-chip contains several Elite commanders who were loyal to the separatist forces during the Great Schism. I want you to contact them and meet me at the appointed co-ordinates, they're also on the chip. Tell them to bring whatever warships they can, fully stocked with warriors and weapons, all loyal to bringing the Prophet's down." Thel tossed a data-chip to Carter, all while Jul fell forward, impaling himself on Takeo's sword, killing him. After he died, Thel flipped the body over on it side and removed the sword. Wiping the blade down, he gave it back to Takeo, warning him to keep the blade sharp. Kilo-Five, however, realized that their mission to keep the Elites fighting within each other had just come to a crushing blow. And they couldn't do a thing about it.

"Admiral, where are you taking John?" Kelly asked.

"some gulag in northern Russia. I don't know the name of the facility, so it's almost impossible to find. I have plenty of contacts, though, so I know it's there." Hood said as Pelican arrived to take the knocked-out soldier away.

"so what about Cortana?" Dempsey asked.

"what she won't know won't hurt her." Carter said, putting the data-chip in his belt.

February 18th, 2553

Classified ONI Base, Sydney, Australia, Earth

"do you realize that I could have both of you stripped of rank and discharged from the service?" Parangosky screeched. Commander Carter-A259 and Fleet Admiral Terrance Hood didn't even flinch. The two officers were in a top-secret ONI Base somewhere in Sydney. Admiral Parangosky somehow heard of the Chief's betrayal and imprisonment. She called the two in her office to demand their side of the story. And she was pissed. Hood and Carter, especially Carter, weren't frightened at all.

"what in the hell made you two think you could throw away our best soldier? Have you two thought of the repercussions of your actions? If the rest of ONI hears about this, then the SPARTAN-IV program could be in jeopardy! We've already done the unthinkable with the II's, kidnapping children and turning them into soldiers, now we're taking one of them and tossing him in the gulag because we don't like what he's done during the war?" After about 25 minutes of angry ranting, Hood finally spoke up.

"Admiral, I want to make something clear. You think you can bypass and scrutinize my every move; you're fucking wrong on that point. You may control all of ONI, but I control the entire UNSC Navy. I can simply bomb every ONI building, facility and installation off the face of the planet. And if you think you can stop me, think again. Your prowlers and corvettes are stealth ships, nothing more. I command cruisers, carriers, and battleships. It'd be the equivalent of putting Mustang against a battle tank; there's no way you'd win."

"are you threatening me, admiral?"

"yes, he is. Now I made my decision that day, and I'm more then willing to accept the consequences. But this is a matter concerning the UNSC Armed Forces. What the hell authority do you have to simply barge into whatever you feel like? THIS IS MY PROBLEM, SO LET ME SOLVE IT!" Carter raised his voice, slightly losing his cool.

"really, a goddamn SPARTAN problem? I'm beginning to believe why the ODST's hate you soldiers so much." Parangosky sneered. She suddenly found herself pinned against the wall, a M392 DMR pressed against her forehead.

"okay admiral, I'm just gonna lay down the law here. I know who you are, I know what you're capable of, and I don't give a damn. You're gonna allow Admiral Hood and I to throw the Chief in prison. You're not gonna say anything about this, you don't know that it even happened. You're gonna list SPARTAN one-one-seven as MIA, he's officially gone. If you don't do what I say…" Carter growled.

"you'll what? Kill me? Trust me, Commander, you don't scare me like I don't scare you. Death doesn't frighten me one bit, I know I'm gonna die sooner or later." Parangosky said with a cold smile. Carter could tell, however, that she was a tad bit afraid, probably because she was being held hostage by a SPARTAN. She knew what they were capable of, if the stories were true, and that scared her just a tiny little bit.

"no. I'm not gonna kill you. But I will take down all of ONI. That's something you don't want to happen, isn't it? I have the ability and means to do so, and if I have to, I'll give you and ONI a war you couldn't possibly believe. And for Captain Osman? Well, a lot of my men in my unit haven't had some trim in a long while, so I think I'll leave her to them." Carter said with a cold laugh, implying that the single male members of the 141 would rape Osman. He wouldn't order that, however. Or would he?

"alright. You want the Chief in jail? Fine. I'll even work to make sure that he doesn't officially exist. I just hope, so desperately hope that you and Admiral Hood know what your doing." Parangosky replied.

"trust me, we know what we're doing. Oh, and as for Dr. Halsey, you're gonna set her free. Now I don't have much of an opinion on her as well, but we still need her, especially now that the war's over. If you don't want her in any secret projects or programs, then don't give her access. Restrict her files, temporarily keep her off the grid. I don't know what you can do, just do it. Keep her under spies if you have to, just don't put her in prison."

"so you want the Chief in prison and you want Halsey to go free?"

"keep a goddamn eye on all the kids on Earth, make sure they don't go missing."

"as I have already told you before, we already have another SPARTAN program in the works."

"yes, I heard. I'm finished speaking, admiral, so make your decision." Carter finished. Parangosky sighed and gave in to the SPARTAN's and Admiral's demands.

"alright. Halsey goes free as well. But I'm keeping her under close watch so she doesn't do anything reckless."

"good."

The massive SPARTAN-III super-soldier put Parangosky down and left the room.

"you never told me. For three months, you never told me about your plans. Why?" Parangosky asked.

"you think you may be the most powerful person on Earth, Admiral. All the people working for you in the deep recesses of ONI probably stoked your ego, thinking you can get away with whatever you want. Believe me, you're not the most powerful person on Earth. And like Dr. Halsey, you can't get away with everything, the law will eventually catch up with you. I'm not threatening you, Admiral, I'm just making sure you understand that, like everyone else, you're time is limited." Hood put his cap back on and left the room, leaving Parangosky to go over what he and Carter told her. It would be the last time Admirals Terrance Hood and Margaret Orlenda Parangosky ever saw each other.

* * *

><p><strong>So, looks like the Task Force 141 betrayed John-117. Want to know what's gonna happen next? Keep reading and reviewing! Next chapter should come up soon!<strong>


	13. Chapter 12

**I rewrote parts of this chapter, mostly the armaments of the UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun. You see, I had always envisioned my ship to be this massive, gargantuan, nearly indestructible warship that both the Covenant and the UNSC would have a hard time taking down. After catching up on the UNSC Infinity, I decided to revamp her weaponry to give the Infinity a run for her money. Hope you enjoy the chapter! Also, I own nothing except hte UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 12<p>

April 8th, 2563

Classified Presidential Building, Washington D.C., United States of America, Earth

"I never knew a presidential bunker was here, of all places." Kennedy muttered, looking around the building.

"none of us knew it, Master Chief pulled us all out, remember?" Shepherd whispered. Everyone agreed a long time ago not to mention the fact that almost the entire Task Force 141 had been taken from Earth's past.

"Captain Keyes, it's good to see you again." President Calvin Millard said, the new President of Earth.

"good to be here, Mr. President. Is there any reason why you asked for all of the 141 to be here?" the former captain asked.

"I'll explain in the room. Come with me." the president said. The massive door opened and they all started to walk in, but they all stopped when they heard the sound of Pelican engines grow louder. They turned around and saw one, beaten-up Pelican fly towards them. It abruptly turned around and landed on the ground behind the 141 and the President.

"what's this?" Carter asked.

"I don't know. But I don't like it." Foley muttered.

The rear doors of the Pelicans opened and one man walked out, carrying a mini-gun in one hand and a lit cigarette in the other. A man who many say is the hero of humanity, but is a sadistic soldier in the eyes of the 141. A man who many say can't be killed, no matter the odds. A man whom the 141 thought was out of their lives for good.

"howdy, Mr. President." John-117 said smugly with a slight Russian accent. Everyone just stared at him, some with open mouths. How the hell did he escape, Vorkuta was supposed to be inescapable. After a long moment of silence,

"John, how'd you escape?" the President asked.

"I'll tell you later. No, I'll give the video footage from Vorkuta. But right now, I'd like to discuss what mission you'll be sending the 141 out on." they noticed that John spoke with a slight Russian accent.

"come with me, all of you." Millard said. None of them were very happy about their current predicament, except John. The president, however, had a look that said he was expecting this to happen for a long time. John chose to follow his former squad down to the room. With the minigun in his hands. President Millard was now plotting how to use this new incident to his own advantage. As they walked through the hallways,

"most, if not all of you, probably don't know what I'm going to tell you. Just so you know, it's classified above top secret, so what goes on in the room stays in the room. We never met, and this conversation did not happen." the president said as they entered an elevator which took them deep below underground. They passed the main command center, the armory-which they didn't stop for because John said he would shoot them-the president's office, and finally they stopped. They ended up facing into a large conference room that was well lit, and had a very large table in the middle with chairs surrounding it.

"please, sit down." the president offered. Everyone sat down except John, he chose to lean against the wall smoking his cigarette, still holding the machine gun.

"do any of you know about a planet called Sergio IV?"  
>everyone shook their heads.<p>

"it's a small planet in the Argentous system, it's very far off, the Covenant never found it. It's now controlled by ONI, it's home to several of the UNSC's smartest scientists. There's a large orbiting scientific space station where most of Section III's top secret experiments are done. Dr. Halsey was working on a project with several other ONI scientists on the station when we lost contact with them around 8 months ago. Regular Marine and ODST squads that we sent in were reported to be either MIA or KIA. I'm told you guys are the best we have, so I'll be sending you in. Captain Keyes, you're in charge. I don't trust you, SPARTAN."

"oh, because of what I did on the Halo ring, what I did at the Oort Cloud, or what I did at Vorkuta?"

"and that's another thing, how'd you escape?"

"I had my resources." John said with a smirk.

"you're gonna explain to me how you escaped." Millard leaned back in his chair.  
>"I'll show you the video clip instead." John said, tossing the president a data-chip. The president plugged it in, and a video screen came up on the wall. It showed John wearing his prison garb fighting another prisoner. From the looks of it, they were deep in the mines underground Vorkuta. After receiving a right uppercut from the prisoner, john stumbled.<p>

"you call yourself a man, a three year-old could hit harder than you!" John mocked. A prison guard came with his baton out, yelling in Russian that everyone go back to work.

"hey, bastard! Go pick on someone your own size!" John yelled in fluent Russian with a smile on his face. The guard was roughly turned around and had a large rock smash his face inward. The prisoner stood up and pulled the SPARTAN to his feet.

"you alright, John?"

"I'm always alright, Sergei! Just remember, every journey begins with a single step! My friends, this, is STEP ONE!" John yelled, yanking a pair of keys from the dead guard's belt.

"SECURE THE KEYS!" the crowed bellowed in support.

"NOW WE TAKE VORKUTA!" John bellowed out in defiance, and everyone around him cheered.

"WHAT IS STEP TWO?!"

"ASCEND FROM DARKNESS!"

"STEP THREE?!"

"RAIN FIRE!"

"STEP FOUR?!"

"UNLEASH THE HORDE!"

"STEP FIVE?"

"SKEWER THE WINGED BEAST!"

"STEP SIX?"

"WIELD A FIST OF IRON!"

"STEP SEVEN?"

"RAISE HELL!"

"STEP EIGHT?"

"FREEDOM!"

John and the prisoners ran through the damp, barely lit hallways of the mines, killing guards whenever they got the chance. After getting into the lift,

"John, don't you think this is suicide?" a prisoner with an American accent asked.

"George, when you got a SPARTAN on your side, anything is possible." john said, picking up a large pickaxe. The doors opened and John brutally killed a guard armed with a standard M6D Magnum. Tossing the pickaxe aside, he grabbed the pistol and rallied the prisoners to the main door leading out to the courtyard.

"EVERYONE, GET DOWN! GET BEHIND THE CARS!" John screamed as machinegun turrets began mowing down the prisoners. Everyone scrambled to get behind the coal cars the prisoners used to transport coal up from the mines to the surface. John grabbed a car and flung it at the machinegun turrets, killing the men manning them.

"STEP THREE?"

"RAIN FIRE!"

Everyone ran into a small building that had a small armory.

"Sergei, break open the small arms locker! George, get to the rooftop for step three! I'll rally the prisoners!" John yelled, working on a speaker system. As massive burning chunks of coal fell down on machinegun emplacements, John's voice boomed through the speaker system.

"my fellow comrades of Vorkuta, the time has come to rise against our oppressors! Today, we show them the hearts of _true_ humans! We have all given our blood for Earth! We have answered her calls without question! We gave our youth, our hearts, our very souls for her protection, as brothers and sisters, we fought side by side against the murderous Covenant! We crawled through the dirt and the blood and the sand to achieve our glorious victory, not for medals, or glory...but for what was right! We fought for revenge...When the Prophet of Truth died, when the Covenant fell apart, when the war was official declared over, how did our leaders repay us? We returned not to the rapturous welcome we rightfully deserved...but to suspicion and persecution! Torn from the arms of our loved ones, we found ourselves here, in the president's hellhole! Here we have languished, with no hope for release...no hope for justice! We have toiled in President Millard's mines until the flesh peeled from our bones... We have watched our comrades succumb to sickness and disease... We have been starved! We have been beaten! But we will not be broken! Today, we will send a message to our corrupt and arrogant leaders! Today, my comrades... Vorkuta BURNS!"

A massive explosion was heard, signaling that step three was complete.

"step four?"

"unleash the horde!" Sergei yelled. Arming themselves with shotguns, the prisoners stormed the gates and gunned down anyone who stood in their way. There was only one problem, a Pelican dropship took to the skies and began mowing down the escapees.

"step five?"

"skewer the winged beast! But how are we to do that?" George asked.

"watch and learn, George!" the SPARTAN yelled. Running as fast as he could, he jumped in the air and fired his shotgun at point-blank range into the cockpit canopy of the Pelican, killing the pilots. Grabbing hold of the nose, and using his superior augmented super-human strength, he flung the Pelican to the side into some gas tanks, causing a large explosion.

"you all know what to do!" John yelled. Everyone ran inside, storming the main arms locker; the guards never really stood a chance. After finding the locker John was looking for...

"step six?" he asked as he wrenched the door off and ran inside.

"wield a fist of iron!" the prisoners bellowed, shooting any guards who came inside. Riot guards then came in with armor that could rival an ODST's ballistic armor.

"here's the fist!" John yelled, walking out with a large Mini-Gun that had been heavily modified to fire larger rounds. He squeezed the trigger, and the guards were torn to shreds. Their armor could never hope to withstand the massive armor piercing/incendiary .50 cal bullets that spewed from the 'death machine.'

"step seven?!"

"raise hell!" the prisoners yelled. They ran outside into the eastern courtyard where reinforcements were called. They were all gunned down, the courtyard was filled with empty casings, destroyed vehicles, and the mangled remains of the guards. they shot their way to a massive hanger containing several Pelicans.

"step eight?!"

"FREEDOM!" the prisoners bellowed. busting open the main door, they climbed inside the Pelicans and took off towards the skies. trouble awaited them, however. 105 pelicans floated in the air, ready to take down the escapees, who only numbered 15.

"looks like we're not gonna have step eight just yet, John." Sergei muttered.

"fuck that, we're free men, all of us." John muttered, taking the controls. A massive dogfight occurred; the prisoners were badly outnumbered. Their only hope of escape was step nine, something that the prisoners created at the last minute to give John a chance of escaping. And John noticed this as all the Pelicans were flying dangerously close to the prison.

"what're you guys doing, remember step eight, freedom!" John yelled over the comm.

"for you, John, not for us! We're gonna initiate step nine! Get the hell outta here and find the President, get your revenge! Avenge the inmates of Vorkuta!" Sergei yelled as he, George, and several other prisoners jumped out of the Pelican.

"step nine, what's that?"

"STEP NINE?!"

"UNLEASH ARMAGEDDON!" the prisoners yelled. One of the pelicans turned around and fired off a nuclear missile, striking the gulag right in the center and vaporizing it in a massive, nuclear fireball. John's Pelican was the only one left flying; he was the only escapee left alive. The film stopped right there, John wasn't happy. Everyone in the room, however, was very apprehensive. They were ready to fight, but John was obviously ready for that. Oddly enough, the president was very calm.

"what do you want?" the president asked.

"a full presidential pardon."

"done." Millard smirked as he leaned back in his chair. John didn't notice his demeanor.

"and I want back in the 141, I want a full reinstatement in the service, rank and everything. The Rise of the Morning Sun is given back to us, along with all its weapons and technologies. And Nova 6 is returned to me." John said.

"I will agree to your demands, seeing you're the one holding everyone else at gunpoint."

"one more thing, whatever I ask for, I get it, ranging from a data-chip, to a NOVA bomb, to a starship. Anything."

"done." the president said. The 141 looked defeated, John looked very happy.

"thank you, Mr. President, I'll be sure to vote for you in the next election." John smirked. He back in the elevator and went back up, leaving behind an angry Task Force 141, and a smirking President.

"how could you let him do that, you don't know what he's capable of!" "You just gave that bastard the ability to ask for anything, he could ask for a freaking NOVA bomb, for all we know!" were among several of the complaints handed to the President.

"that's enough!" the president barked, silencing everyone.

"get up to the surface and get to the airport, I'll take care of John-117."

"are you gonna give us the _Morning Sun_?" Dr. Brown asked.

"the _UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun_, along with its weapons and technologies will be waiting for you at your destination. But I'm not giving John his Nova 6. Oh, one more thing. Don't be afraid to ask for whatever you want, I'll cover it."

"does that include guns?" Kat asked.

"like I said, I'll take care the Chief." that was the President's last word. He then pulled Chernov aside and whispered something to him. After the two chatted, they walked back in the elevator and headed up to the surface.

"I say we stop at the armory, get some guns, and then take care of that psycho once we get up there." Jun muttered.

"even if we did that, it's a lopsided battle. Hell, no matter how big your army is, if the Master Chief is on the opposing side, you know you're gonna lose." Nixon muttered. Everyone didn't know if that was the truth or if he was simply exaggerating Sierra-117's combat prowess. They arrived at the surface to find the Pelican was gone.

"great, he's gone. I say we just get to the airport and leave 'em behind." Polonsky quickly said.

"no, we can't do that. The president told me as we were leaving that we can't leave without John." Chernov said.

"that's great." Dunn muttered.

John was nowhere to be seen. Several hours later, they heard the sound of a warthog engine grow louder and louder. A civilian warthog pulled up, carrying John. Now they knew why he was gone so long, he was busy getting all cleaned up. John looked like a regular Joe, not an escaped prison convict. The 141 would be riding in presidential limousines. Even they were built like a tank, John more then likely found several armor-piercing weapons in his Warthog. They all wondered where he found it, however.

"you guys know where you're going, I'll just follow you!" John yelled, sitting behind the wheel of a Warthog. The limos took off, and John closely followed. As the vehicles headed to the airport,

"what did Pres. Millard mean when he said he was gonna take care of John?" Eddie Buck asked.

"hopefully he'll send some Pelicans to blow John to pieces so we don't have to deal with him." Richtofen muttered. No Pelicans ever came. As they arrived at the airport,

"alright, our flight is Interplanetary Airlines 422. It'll be leaving gate 65 in three hours. Plenty of time for the president to take care of John." Shepherd muttered. Everyone slowly dissipated throughout the airport, except John. Carter and Kat had disappeared, and Richtofen and MacTavish went to the stand to buy some pretzels.

"I honestly can't believe the president gave in. Is it me, or did anyone else notice that he didn't seem scared or frightened at the least? It's almost as if he planned the whole escape." Mason said.

"nah, that's crazy, no one would let that psycho out of prison." Jorge said, calling his former friend and comrade a psycho.

"wonder how the president's gonna take care of him." Mason said.

"well, if he doesn't, I guess we can take him." Carter said, suddenly appearing. His hair looked a little askew, for some odd reason. The whole squad knew where he and Kat had gone to.

"you gotta remember, he's been in a gulag for the past five years; you gotta fight in gulags every day just to survive. They're very brutal. I would know; I've been in one." Price said as the 141 headed to their plane.

"what's that supposed to mean?" Kat asked, rubbing the hickey that 'mysteriously' appeared on her neck.

"I'm gonna grab a quote from Apocalypse Now. 'I'm here a week now waiting for a mission getting softer; every minute I stay in this room, I get weaker, and every minute Charlie squats in the bush, he gets stronger.' For the past five years, John has been fighting in Vorkuta everyday to survive. The only fighting we've done is handle a few extremely small rebels on far-off planets, extremely light compared to what we did during the Human-Covenant War. And we haven't been fighting every day, we became rather lax. Sure, we kept up our strength, but our skill as a combat unit went down extremely drastically." Price said. That wasn't a reassuring thought at all. No one noticed the airport security following them, all heavily armed with BRHB55's and MA5C's. The security force let the squad board the plane. Once the hatch closed, the airport security immediately opened fire on the plane. Unfortunately, the fuselage of the transport was strong enough to take several shots from a Covenant plasma torpedo. Everyone noticed the gunfire, however. Nikolai went up to the cockpit and yanked the door open.

"WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR, TAKE OFF ALREADY!" he screamed. Problem was, there were no pilots. He was drunk, no surprise there.

"Ramius, we need you to fly the plane!" he yelled. The Russian pilot sat down and worked his magic. As in, Ramius gunned it, the transport took off down the tarmac at speeds that _no_ flying aircraft should even dream of going. As the plane left Earth's atmosphere and headed towards Sergio IV, everyone settled down and made themselves comfortable. As John snoozed away, his cell phone that he stole from the warthog rang.

"yes, Mr. President? Okay, I'll tell 'em. Carter, Kat, you two are being charged with indecent exposure in a public facility, Ramius, you're being charged with the hijacking of an airplane!" Absolutely no one believed him.

"yeah right, John, no one's gonna believe you." Jorge muttered. John got up and went into the cockpit and sat down in the co-pilot's seat.

"hey Ramius, did you hear me?"

"yeah, and I say you're lying." the Russian snarled.

John plugged his cell phone in and printed off an official arrest warrant issued by the President, meant for Marco 'Nikolai' Ramius. John was telling the truth. "oh fuck." he muttered as he read the paper.

"yeah. If you don't believe me about Kat and Carter, I'll send you the video clip from the cameras in the airport. Apparently, Carter and Kat were having too much fun and they never bothered to go to a private place. Right in the men's bathroom. (scoffs) that'll leave a mark in your mind." John smiled. He forwarded the video clip, but not to the Russian's phone. He didn't know it, but he inadvertently sent the video clip right to the movie system onboard the plane, so everyone from behind the cockpit back was seeing Carter and Kat screw each other. As John settled in, he pulled out a Magnum and got it ready. He just did that because he was paranoid, but he never knew what was going on back there. Oddly, he found the gun on the plane; he never brought it with him.

"hey, wanna listen to some tunes?" Ramius asked, plugging in his iPod. The cockpit was soon filled with the sounds of the Rolling Stones. As the heavy metal tunes of _Metallica_ filled the cockpit, the door was slammed open by a very angry Carter. Faster then even John could give himself credit for, he turned around and fired three rounds into Carter's chest. Carter stumbled backward, blood staining his clothes and the felt carpet of the plane. Everyone was in shock, especially John. He never knew he could move that fast, even without his armor.

"you son of a bitch, I should've killed you when we got back to Earth." Carter moaned, coughing up blood. John just grabbed a bio-foam canister and knelt down next to the wounded SPARTAN. Carter tried to crawl away but John held him down. Still, he continued to struggle.

"hold still damn it, I'm trying to fix you." John muttered through gritted teeth.

"get off me!" Carter growled. He stopped moving when he felt the cold steel of a Magnum press against his forehead.

"I'm not gonna ask you again." John said very coldly. Carter relented and allowed John to fix his wounds. He then stood up and headed back in the cockpit, closing the door. That little escapade just fed more fuel to the fire that John was not to be trusted. In the cockpit,

"hey Marco, how long until we get to the planet?" John asked.

"with the modified slipstream drive, it'll take us 12 hours."

"is the drive on?"

"crap." the Russian pilot said. he then started activating the drive, wondering what everyone would say when they realized that there was a slipstream drive on the plane and he never turned it on. The drive was activated and they were off on their new mission. In the cockpit, John and Ramius were air guitaring to _Metallica_.Oh, and they were downing shots like there was no tomorrow. John may still have felt extreme feelings of betrayal and wanting revenge, but he couldn't stay made at Nikolai Ramius. At least, not yet, that is. In first class, the 141 were discussing what they were gonna do with John. When they got to the planet, they spotted something that was very familiar to them all: the Rise of the Morning Sun.

"been a long time seen I've seen that ship." Jacob muttered.

"did you give the Morning Sun to ONI, or did ONI take it?" John asked.

"no on both of them. What the hell are ONI doing with our ship?" Veronica asked.

"I intend to find out." John angrily growled. The radio crackled and Ramius turned it on.

"….._Interplanetary Airlines heavy transport 422, this is ONI outpost 47-Alpha, Charlie Hotel speaking. Please respond._"  
>"Dr. Halsey, this is Cpt. Keyes, we're in position to extract you."<p>

"I'm sorry, Captain, but your transport can't carry all the wounded we have here. You'll have to use your ship to help us evacuate the facility." Dr. Halsey replied.

"What about Cortana?" John suddenly asked randomly. He then noticed that everyone was rather silent when he asked that. John turned around, his stolen Magnum aimed at the 141's general direction.

"where is she?" John asked again.

Hudson reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a data chip. For a moment, John seemed to relax. Everyone knew that John was still, in their minds, a psychopath who needed to be monitored. John reached up and grabbed the data chip from Hudson.

"Cortana's in here?"

"yeah." the former CIA agent replied.

"you're absolutely sure? You're not doing yourself any good if you're lying." John said, motioning with his newly-acquired Magnum.

"she's in there." Hudson said a little angrily.

"good. Well captain, your in charge. I'm just a soldier." John said.

"fine. Get us on the _Morning Sun_. Hopefully, all our armor and weapons will still be there." captain Keyes said. As the transport soared closer to the massive warship, everyone noticed that there were several large pods lining the hull. They also saw several large turrets and missile pods that they didn't recognize. The transport landed in one of the hanger bays of the large super carrier.

"home, sweet home." Brown said happily.

"alright, go down the armory, I want everyone ready to get Halsey outta there." Jacob ordered. They found the ship was fully staffed with UNSC Naval personal, UNSC Marines and ODST's. It was fully stocked with weapons and munitions, vehicles and equipment. Most of the ships ship-to-ship weaponry, however, had been removed and were replaced with even more powerful weapons. The Wunderwaffe cannons were still there, seeing as they couldn't be remove. Richtofen and Brown, however, didn't leave.

"yes, you two need something?" Keyes asked.

"before you take command of your ship again, we need to show you the improvements we made to the Morning Sun."

"what kind of improvements?" Jacob asked a little suspiciously. He knew what Richtofen and Brown were capable of, and that scared him just a little bit.

"follow us." Brown said with a warming smile, but his eyes told that he held many secrets. Keyes grabbed a random Desert Eagle from a Pelican and holstered it.

"in case some of your… 'improvements' are zombies." he said, gesturing for the two scientists to take the lead.

"the first new improvement we're looking at today will be the engine room." Brown said as they walked in the elevator and were whisked away at a rather fast speed.

"I don't remember the elevator moving this fast."

"we modified the elevator system with highly compressed coils and railings, similar to what the MAC guns use. Well, here we are." Brown said. The whole trip took only around 5 seconds. The three men stepped out of the elevator and found themselves walking down a long, yet very defensible hallway that, oddly enough, had the walls lined with concrete. The Captain noticed that the walls seemed to hum. He put his hand to it and was shocked to feel it gently vibrate. He would ask about that after they showed him the new engine. They opened the door at the end and found themselves in a large room that was 8 stories high, with metal catwalks and stairs lining the walls. Engineers and technicians read and put in new information on the computer consoles and screens covering the walls. What really caught the captain's attention was the massive, alien engine that was in the middle of the room. It was obviously Forerunner, but had numerous pipes and hoses connected to it that arced downward into a large pool of water at the bottom of the engine room. There were also large platforms holding massive meteors that glowed a strange color that looked like a mix between yellow and orange. These rocks also had wires and tubes connecting them to the main reactor.

"is that the Forerunner reactor you talked about?"

"that's it. I took it from a destroyed Forerunner Dreadnought. The actual reactor is much larger then what you're seeing, but whatever happened to the ship caused the reactor to be destroyed. That was all my team and I could salvage. I hooked it up to a UNSC fusion reactor with a nuclear power plant." Brown said proudly.

"nuclear power plant?"

"you see the giant pool at the bottom? It uses a super-chilling ionization unit that constantly cools down the reactor. It's much more efficient then the original UNSC reactor we used during the war. When the war ended, we took apart the reactor to find out what damage we did to it. It was much more destructive then we ever imagined, the cooling units were totally burned away, the ionization packets were melted down, it was a complete mess. The Forerunner reactor was the only thing powering the ship. So we installed a new UNSC reactor used on UNSC super carriers. We also used ideas from the past from nuclear power-plants. That explains the water. If anyone were to jump in there, they'd freeze to death within seconds. Heck, you could fire a flamethrower in the water and the flame would turn into one giant ice crystal. That's how cold it is." Richtofen said. Noticing Keyes confused look, Richtofen continued.

"let me say this. The more power we pump into the reactor, the more it cools itself."

"impressive. I have to ask, though, what's with the concrete hallway?" Keyes asked, lighting his pipe.

"there's only one other spot in the galaxy with concrete like that: Chernobyl. We found that the Element 115 had spread itself too far out and was causing severe damage to the hull. It was strengthening it, but in a manner that caused the atomic particles to become destabilized. The metal was literally warping within itself, although it doesn't look like that at a first glance. We barely caught it at the end of the war. If that kept on going unchecked, if would've warped the hull so badly the ship would've warped itself inside out. So we stripped the ship down to the skeletal structure, shot off all the damaged metal into the sun, and rebuilt it with a new titanium alloy that's stronger and more lighter then ordinary metals. But because of the Element 115 threat, we lined the walls with enough concrete to rival Chernobyl to keep the 115 out." the German replied.

"but wouldn't that keep the 115 confined to the engine room alone?"

"we thought of that, so we lined the engine room with filters that process the 115 from an radioactive element into an electrical current that we can send to anywhere in the ship. All from the bridge." Brown said.

"what stopped the 115 from warping the metal too badly during the war?"

"we've been looking into that ever since the end of the war. We still don't know how it stopped warping the metal. I can't explain it any better than that, because we honestly don't know. Let's show you the weapons, shall we?" Brown said, hoping to change the subject.

"just one more thing. When we were walking down the hall, I thought I heard the concrete walls hum, if you could call it that, and I could actually feel them vibrate." the captain said very sternly.

"dammit, I was hoping you wouldn't have caught that. Alright. Don't tell anyone else this, but there's something rather dangerous behind these walls. It's almost as if the Ununpentium has taken a life of it's own." Richtofen said.

"what do you mean?"

"what we mean is, the element 115 had collected itself into a large body of raw energy. We tried to harness it, but every attempt ended in failure. We even tried to destroy it, but that never worked as well. We managed to have it contained, but we can only contain it for so long."

"can we release it through the Wunderwaffe Cannons?"

"that's what we've been doing. But every time excess energy is vented out, more energy comes to fill the empty space."

"what can you do to fix it?"

"we can't do anything at the moment. So, do you wanna see the new weapons or not?" Brown asked, hoping to change the subject.

"anything to keep my mind off of what you two just told me." Keyes said rather sourly. They walked back in the elevator and found themselves going up, and then left.

"where are we, exactly?" Keyes asked, a little confused.

"we're at the missile pods. Not the Archer pods, the very large ones you saw at the top of the ship. We filled up all the Archer pods with standard Archer missiles, but we wanted to augment them with more powerful missiles. These new missiles are what we're gonna show you up here."

"I notice we only have a limited amount of missiles, the really big ones up top. Too expensive to build?"

"not enough room on the rest of the ship for the new pods." Richtofen lied as they walked out of the elevator and into what everyone called, 'the big-bang room.' The three officers walked into an extremely large corridor that Keyes estimated to be 550 meters wide, 2,550 long and 445 meters tall. Massive cranes were busy loading in large missiles into the tubes while the technicians guided the new weapons in their tubes. The missiles had a width and height of 8 meters. Keyes was surprised by the sheer size of these new weapons, they were very, very large. He wondered why they were built so massive, although he was sure he would get the answers soon.

"technician, can you pull a missile out for us?" Brown asked. The latch opened up and a crane helped pull out the massive missile. It was 15 meters long, had a chrome look with a green warhead; the main tube had several bumps on the outer shell.

"this is the Mk. 55 EMNP missile, code-name 'Javelin'. EMNP stands for Electro Magnetic Nuclear Pulse."

That totally confused the captain. An EMP nuclear missile? That didn't make any sense at all.

"we'll explain it to you. When Richtofen and I began designing new missiles, we thought of building a contingent of missiles that released an EMP pulse to be used against Covenant shields. But then we thought, why not combine an EMP missile with that of an Archer missile? And so the Javelin was born. When fired, it produces a continuous Electro Magnetic Pulse that disables any electrical systems around it. It's synced with the rest of the missiles, so it doesn't disable them. But it will disable anything else it touches. Same basic principle of the 'disable' setting of our Wunderwaffe Cannons, just on a much smaller scale. The warhead is pretty interesting as well." Brown said, opening the warhead. Keyes saw that they were using the Implosion design, which was wrapped at the end of the old 'gun assembly' design. That confused him.

"you mind explaining this to me?" he asked, pointing at the warhead with his pipe.

"it's rather simple. When the warhead hit's its target, the fissile uranium goes down the barrel and slams into the fissile uranium target at the end. The target is surrounded by several large bricks of C4, G4, and molded C-12 explosives; all of them have rather small particles of unstable atoms painted onto their outer layer. And when they go off, well, that'll create a rather big boom. The main tube of the weapon is actually split in half. The rear half contains the fuel it needs to travel. The forward half contains 35 W87/Mk-21 warheads we replicated precisely. So when the warhead goes off, the explosion will cause the 35 warheads to go off as well. That makes the already big boom to go even bigger. They're just as effective as a SHIVA bomb, but the advantage is that you can launch these suckers in waves. And the best part of these babies…." Richtofen said as he walked away some distance. He then pulled out his Walther P38 pistol, cocked it, and shot a round at the missile. Keyes quickly ducked behind the missile so he wouldn't get shot. The bullet simply bounced off the missile's energy shield.

"what the hell's wrong with you, shooting at a nuclear missile?!" Keyes yelled angrily. Richtofen laughed manically.

"that's the beauty of these new missiles; they come with an energy shield to prevent them from being shot down!"

The captain was stunned; they really outdid themselves this time. A missile with an energy shield made sure that it would almost be impossible to be shot out of the sky.

"how many hits can the shield take?" Keyes asked.

"depends on what they through at it. A point-defense laser, no problem. Plasma cannons from a Seraph or Banshee, it can take several hits. A fuel rod from the aforementioned fighters will disable the shield, but not the torpedo. One plasma torpedo from a Covenant warship, however, will vaporize the missile. But that's the beauty of the EMP field it generates, we built it so that it disables plasma weaponry as well as electrical fields. It's safe to say the Javelin's are pretty much unstoppable." Brown said very proudly. Despite nearly having a heart attack, Keyes was extremely impressed with the new missiles.

"so how many missiles in total are onboard? what do we got?"

"3,750x30 Archer missile pods, 3,450x30 Rapier missile pods, 3,230x30 Howler missiles, 4,490x55 Javelin missiles, and well over 4,000 of the M97 Lance GMW system. Those are mounted all over the ship. With the Javelins, we got well over 22,000 individual missiles in stock. I'm not gonna give you a number of the rest of the missiles, would take too long. But think of it like this, it's somewhere nearing in the millions."

"anything else? We gotta have more than that." Keyes asked. The two scientists looked at each other somewhat nervously.

"okay. Don't tell anyone this, especially John-117. His Nova-6 BioChemical WMD is perfect. What we didn't like was that he hid it from us. We rebuilt his weapon, and put it on missiles. We have 5,000x25 Nova 6 missiles on the ship. Please, Captain, don't tell him we have that onboard." Brown said very carefully.

"what else you got to show me? Wait, scratch that. Will the next weapon give me a heart attack?"

"nope."

"good. What is it?" Keyes asked, taking a very long drag from his pipe to calm him down.

"the new ship-to-ship cannons. We'll take you to them." Brown said, leading the captain into the elevator. After about a 5-second trip, they found themselves looking at a titanium-steel ladder leading upwards.

"where does this go?"

"one of the cannons. I'll go first." Brown said. The three men climbed the ladder and entered a large spacious room. On opposite sides of the room were two doors.

"the aft door leads into the gunner's quarters. The front door leads to the gun schematics and control room." Richtofen said, opening the front door. They found two leather chairs in the middle of the large room. In front was a large tactical display of the new cannons. It made sense to have a fully enclosed gun turret instead of glass; the enemy could shoot right through the glass and kill the gunners.

"this is the Mk. 25 Autofire Anti-ship turret. It fires a 50 lb armor piercing, incendiary high explosive warhead. There are currently 3,550 cannons positioned around the ship. The barrels are lined with tightly wound coils that give the rounds an extremely fast kinetic speed that enables them to punch through the shields of a Covenant super carrier."

"you said the aft door leads to the gunner's quarters. Why put quarters up here?"

"well, we have to. The gunners are gonna be stationed up here for a long time. So we built quarters for them so they wouldn't stay up all night. Four men man the turret, each pair of men take 12 hours shifts."

"what about defensive weaponry?" Keyes asked. While the new missiles and turrets were very impressive, he wanted to know what they had for defense.

"the ship emits a massive EMP field that disables any plasma torpedoes and enemy fighters that come too close, we interweaved it with the energy shields. And we strengthen the shields as well. You could ram a Covenant super carrier with this and suffer only extremely minor damage."

"so no 50mm turrets, no point-defense lasers?"

"we have about a million point-defense lasers onboard, but those are back-ups if the EMP field fails, which it won't. But it doesn't hurt to be safe. We also have that new ARC-85 Point Defense Anti-Aircraft System onboard."

"I heard about that. Supposedly, it lays down a field of flak that completely surrounds the ship, prevents anything from getting through."

"you're right. We modified it, however, to work in sync with our weapons systems, all of them. Nothing is getting through to the hull of this ship." Richtofen said proudly.

"anything else, I wanna see what kind of firepower you crammed onto this ship." Keyes said, eager to see more.

"wanna see the MAC cannon?" Richtofen said.

"sure."

The elevator trip was, again, short as they arrived at the breech for the MAC cannon, which was overbearingly massive. The captain had no idea what the gun really was, it looked nothing like a standard MAC gun.

"what is this?"

"This is the XM25 Helical Auto-Rail 'Super' Magnetic Accelerator Cannon. It's basically a toned down version of the MAC cannons the ODP's use, although the percentage of it being toned down is about .1%."

"I'm afraid I don't understand at all. Can you explain it to me?"

"as you know, for rail guns, the ability to use Lorentz acceleration over Gaussian acceleration makes rail guns very superior to coil guns. But the warhead firing at a very fast speed tends to burn out the coils rather quickly, so that's why Gauss weaponry is used more often then what Lorentz built. However, this gun combines the best of both worlds. The helical main rail system combines both Lorentz and Gauss acceleration, effectively making it a coil and rail gun in one being. And as you can see, if you just look in the barrel…." Brown said, slowly opening the large breech. The coils inside were so tightly wound up that he didn't think a regular MAC round could fit in.

"…..these smaller rails, the blue ones, provide an additional conductor that doubles the power by providing a pulling as well as a pushing force as per the Lorentz equations. These large coils, the big red ones, use plasma technology to make sure the rounds don't burn out the coils; to sum that up, we greased the inside of the barrel. These coils also recycle any excess energy left behind from the previous shot so it can be used for the next shot. Because of the size and sheer amount of the coils, not to mention we also added a plasma screen all on the inside of the barrel, you can now fire 10 rounds in a single burst. And because of the Forerunner reactor, you can push that to fire a bit more faster: to it's greatest extent, you can fire 15 rounds in a single burst, just allow the gun to cool off if you do that." Brown said very proudly. The captain's eyes went wide when he said that; not even the ODP's could pull that off. No ship or space station in the fleet could do that.

"so…. What does the XM25 fire?" Keyes asked. Richtofen motioned for a crane operator to bring up a large, bullet-shaped slug. Keyes noticed that there were several small nuclear signs all over it.

"this is the Mk. 55 MAC round. As you can tell, it's much smaller. It's also much more lighter then a standard round so it can travel farther and retain all of its kinetic energy. Like the rest of the weapons we showed you, the warhead comes complete with a nuclear payload."

"let me guess, old nuclear warheads from the Cold War?" Keyes asked sarcastically.

"yup. We rebuilt and redesigned the old Tsar Bomba warheads to make them smaller; the warhead for the Mk. 55 can hold 5 Tsar Bomba's. So that is 250 megatons. It's surrounded by a thick case of lithium deuteride and uranium tamper. And because this gun is basically a MAC gun used on ODP's, there's practically an unlimited range for these babies." Richtofen said with a wicked smile.

"do these MAC rounds come with an EMP field like everything else on this ship?" Keyes asked.

"no, they would short out the coils."

"okay, I just have to ask. Is the Morning Sun itself a giant EMP generator, you said it generated an EMP field to disable fighters." Keyes asked.

"how we generate the field to disable fighters is actually somewhat simple: we just slapped four large EMP generators on the outer hull on key positions. Whatever energy they don't use, the generators automatically convert into power and send it back into the ship. Why do you ask?"  
>"because everything I've seen so far save the Mk. 55 is a nuclear weapon slash EMP generator."<p>

"the failures of Group 821 taught me something: it's better to have quality over quantity. So for over the past 10 years, I worked pretty damn hard to make sure this thing stays out on top." Brown said, drinking from his flask.

"what about the Wunderwaffe Cannons, they look more skinny."

"you know how they originally looked like giant .50 cal bullets? Well we found out that we could remove most of the weapon without downgrading it's firepower. That's why they look more skinny. Actually, now that the guns are skinnier, they can actually channel more and more power into the barrels because there isn't as much metallic bulk for the energy to pass through."

"that's good to know. One question, how effective are these weapons against a Forerunner Dreadnought?" Keyes asked.

"Dreadnought will still shrug them off. The Wunderwaffe Cannons are really the only effective weapons against anything Forerunner." Richtofen said.

"this just came up in my head, but didn't the ship originally come with two MAC cannons?"

"we wanted to slap another gun on, but the sheer size and cost of it prevented that. But one gun is more than enough, in my opinion." Brown said, drinking some more.

"alright, gimme what we got. Weapon-wise." Keyes said, wanting to know once and for all what they have.

"alright. One modified MAC cannon, two Wunderwaffe Cannons, 3,550 Mk. 25 Autofire Anti-ship turrets, thousands upon thousands of missile pods, 1,990,000 point defense lasers, 1,345,000 plasma torpedo launchers, 45 SHIVA nuclear weapons, 35 NOVA bombs, we removed the ATAF missile turrets, too expensive, and we removed the Yamato cannons once we put on the Mk. 25 turrets. No need for the Yamato guns. We upgraded the plating to 20 layers of Titanium-A triple armor which, again, can be polarized. And as we mentioned earlier, we got energy shielding to help protect the ship, 20 layers this time. The Arbiter got his people to help properly install the plasma turrets and plasma torpedo launchers so we wouldn't burn through the surrounding armor and hull plating when they went off." Brown summed it all up.

"do we have an energy projector?"

"we don't need 'em. We got 35 NOVA bombs and two Wunderwaffe cannons, the definition of overkill doesn't even begin to describe the armaments on this ship."

"you guys really outdid yourselves, you really did. I just wanna know, how much punishment can this ship take?" Keyes asked.

"you know the _Infinity_-class ships? the new big ones? You know how much punishment they can take? Well, this thing can take a punishment that only those ships would dream of taking in their wildest imaginations. It's very safe to say that this ship is very unstoppable." Brown said proudly.

"is there anything onboard to stop a MAC round?"

"yes, we constructed one ourselves, the only in existence. The I-85 Anti-MAC Round system. Did you see those large, glass-like turrets mounted all over the ship? All 195 of them? Well, those emit an invisible, yet very powerful laser beam that burns the MAC round to nothing before it touches the ship. The targeting computer system onboard this ship is literally, second-to-none for that system. It works better with an AI, but even without one, the system can knock out 10 MAC rounds before it needs to be recharged." Brown said with a smile. Captain Keyes was astounded, utterly astounded. He had always thought that a weapon's system that can stop a MAC round would be a very strong weapon, provided it remain in UNSC hands. He never would've thought it would become real.

"you guys are the best, you know that? But are there any cons to all this new tech?"

"nope." Captain Keyes didn't exactly believe them. Nevertheless, he took their word for it and headed back to the bridge. He was very glad to see the bridge very clean and brand new. On the trip back to Earth, the bridge was a real mess; blood and bullet shells were everywhere, not to mention the corpses. Keyes quickly shook that horrid nightmare out of his head, he didn't want anymore nightmares about the zombies invading his ship. He could only hope Richtofen had fixed that problem, although part of him told him not to ask.

"captain on deck!" Lt. Hikowa announced, standing up. The rest of the bridge crew did so as well.

"at ease." Keyes said. Everyone sat down, but not the ship's tactical officer. She looked like she needed some sleep, very badly. Her eyes were very bloodshot and had bags underneath her eyes.

"welcome aboard, sir."

"likewise, Lieutenant. Prof. Brown and Dr. Richtofen have been showing me around the ship. So, what do you think of her?"

"to be honest, sir,….. I feel like I'm back at the academy. These new systems and weapons are a lot of homework. Don't get me wrong, they're very worth it. But….." she said very tired. Richtofen and Brown stifled their laughter. Keyes shot a glare at them.

"go get some sleep, Lt. That's an order."

Hikowa simply rubbed her eyes.

"I'm sorry, sir, what was the question again?"

"Get. To. Your. Bunk. ASAP." Keyes said very clearly.

"yes….. yes sir." Hikowa said, saluting and then leaving the bridge. Once she left, Brown and Richtofen laughed.

"you two remind me of an old Academy professor who liked to torture their students with extra homework the night before the big exam." Keyes said.

"I wouldn't know of that. You know, me working for Nazi Germany and all." Richtofen said, scratching his head. Even after all this time, he still wore his old Nazi uniform.

"I'm sure you do." Keyes said, sitting down in the command chair. He felt that it was real leather, instead of the cheap, synthetic imitation. _probably Captain's privileges for commanding what is easily the most powerful spaceship in human history_ Keyes thought to himself. He looked around the large bridge and took it all in. He recognized most of the bridge crew, all of them were from the Pillar of Autumn.

"hey, I have another question: what about the teleporters?" he glanced at the teleporter in the corner of the bridge.

"we still have them onboard, but we're trying to limit their usage, they draw a lot of power directly from the main reactor. That's why we modified the elevators." Richtofen said.

"but the teleporters are faster, no?"

"not by much. Well, captain, I believe that's all the time we have for today, we gotta show the 141 the new weapons." Richtofen said, leaving the bridge.

"one more thing!" he yelled out the door. Richtofen and Brown came back.

"am I gonna have any more problems with zombie attacks?" the Captain warned.

"we got cleaned out the entire morgue and the whole ship about five months after we made it back. I promise you, we won't have any more infestations." Richtofen said. Captain Keyes didn't believe him one bit. Jacob sat down in his chair again, going over all that he had just learned about his new ship. One thought, however, kept on coming back: John-117 is free and out for revenge. What the hell was he gonna do with him now? What was anyone gonna do with him, now that he was back?

* * *

><p>April 8th, 2563<p>

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

Deck 15

"glad you're all here, glad that you haven't strangled the Chief yet. I would imagine you guys have plenty of questions, especially concerning the new weapons you see. These are the newest weapons by the UNSC. But for those of you who are from the past, we got some new toys for you as well." Brown said. Turning around, he picked up what appeared to be an MA5D rifle, although it looked a little different.

"this is the newest variation of the MA5D, the 5C/I variant. It's basically the same as the standard rifle, but the barrel has been heavily chromed and augmented to fire high-explosive incendiary rounds. I'll demonstrate." Brown said. Pulling up a paper target, he took aim and fired about 15 rounds. The target immediately burst into flames.

"because of the barrel, the bullets now travel at near-hypersonic speeds, they'll punch through just about anything. Comes with a grenade launcher shotgun attachment, although you can figure that one out for yourself. The DMR rifles, the MA rifles, and all the battle rifles in the entire UNSC armory have been augmented like that, despite that the BR's fire a different round from the DMR's and the MA's."

"this is the M7/S-I variant of the M7 SMG. Same as the regular version, carries incendiary capabilities. The silencer has been augmented with magnetic coils that enable the round to punch through energy shields like they weren't even there. And if you're worried about barrel blowing up, I augmented the silencers to vent any excess smoke or gas back to the pin. Essentially, the more bullets you put down range, the higher the rate of fire." Putting the SMG back, Richtofen grabbed another weapon from the rack. It looked like an SRS-99 rifle.

"this is the SRS-99-SD/I variant of the standard SRS-99-SD rifle. As you can guess, the I stands for incendiary. These new rifles, however, have had their barrels redesigned with more coils and rifling on the inside that enables the slug to punch through a Hunter's shield within the first blow. Within reason, of course. It has to be a direct blow for it to actually work, if it's a glancing shot, it'll just bounce off. We got a demonstration here." technicians lined up a massive slab of Titanium-A armor that was 1 meter thick. On the front was the shield from a Hunter. Behind the block, a Warthog was pulled up.

"this is how powerful the weapon is." the Nazi muttered. Holding the rifle up, instead of putting it on a mount, he took aim and pulled the trigger. The round tore through the shield, slammed through the block of steel and destroyed the Warthog's engine block.

"I'm impressed. Very impressed." Romeo said.

"the M90's and M45's basically fire Dragon's Breath rounds, they're very effective, don't hesitate to use them. Now for the weapons from the past." Brown said.

"Miller, this is for you. Your old M1A1 Carbine rifle fired the standard .30 Carbine round. The newer .30 carbine rounds have a powder that burns faster, and the bullet is incendiary like the rest of the guns. It took a while to get that working, but your rifle is now up to par with a DMR. Here, take a shot down the range." Brown said, tossing a modified Carbine rifle to the soldier. He took the small rifle and fired off all 15 rounds at the metal targets. While they didn't pierce them, they definitely left their mark.

"against a gelatinous target, that thing will do very lethal damage. Fire at that gel block." the block was turned into a ugly black color from the burn.

"Polonsky, we modified your Garand the same way. Because of the extra stock, however, we were able to slap more… equipment on your weapon. It now fires the 7.62x51mm NATO round. Incendiary as well. The new equipment is extra coils wrapping around the breech that allow the bullet to travel faster and farther compared to before. Roebuck, Dempsey, your B.A.R's are essentially the same weapon as before. But the rifling has been replaced with magnetic coils found in the M99 rifle that enables your rounds to travel faster and farther. It's much more lighter to, so you won't be bogged down. We also slapped on a grenade launcher on the bottom, but it's removable if you want to."

"what about scopes and sights?" Dempsey asked.

"you see the railing on the top, you can slide on any scope you want."

"what's this?" Roebuck asked, pressing a button on the side. A flip-action bayonet came out near the barrel.

"you always wanted that, so we slapped that on, just for you."

"sweet." he said with a smile.

"Chernov, Anatoly, your rifles still fire the 7.62x54mm rounds, but we augmented the barrels with extra coiling. Standard round is armor-piercing incendiary. For the Dragunov rifle, we added a magnetize recoiling spring near the breech so the bullets will travel faster and lighter. It's mostly reverse-engineered Forerunner tech, the actually technology was lost during the Great War."

"so what else do we got?" Reznov asked.

"Nikolai, Petrenko, Reznov, your SMG's were a bit tricky. We pulled the barrels out and added newer, more lighter versions. The coiling on the out side is gone because we added a blow-back system that turns the excess gas back into the bolt to allow for a faster rate of fire. Because of the pistol rounds your weapons fired, we couldn't make them amour-piercing or incendiary. But the rate of fire makes up for that."

"how fast?" Nikolai asked.

"1,140 rpm."

"damn, that's almost as fast as I drink vodka." Nikolai said, drinking more vodka.

"Takeo, your T-100 SMG suffers the same as the Ppsh-41. We simply made a faster rate of fire to make up for the lack of punching power, 1,300 rpm. That's more than enough, especially considering how you fight."

"aim for the knees, stab 'em in the head." the Japanese officer recounted.

"because of that, your gun comes with a flip-action bayonet like the B.A.R."

"what about you, Richtofen, what about your MP-40?" Shepherd asked.

"why would I talk about that, I'm the only one that uses it. Now for the Cold War weapons upwards, it's basically the same. The M-16's, Commandos, AK-47's, M4A1 carbines, SCAR-H's, they were all augmented to fire 7.62x51mm NATO rounds, so we can all carry more ammunition. That means a bigger barrel, which means more stopping power. All the bullets pack armor-piercing with incendiary capabilities. With all that lead flying downrange, it'll be hell for the poor bastards on the opposite end. Now, we would like to show you the rocket launchers and SPARTAN lasers, but we're almost out of time. So we're gonna show you one last weapon we've developed." Brown said, waving his arm. A technician brought out table and set a massive brick of pure Titanium-A. Brown pulled out a large handgun.

"this is the IMIA1 Desert Eagle/I _Handkanone_. It has successfully replaced the M6 Magnum as the standard sidearm for the entire UNSCDF. It fires a standard 12.7x75mm armor-piercing round. I'll demonstrate." Brown said. He then put on a large metal glove-like gauntlet around his right wrist. Picking up the over-sized pistol, he cocked it, took aim and fired. The block ended up flying off the table and landing with a thud. Brown put the gun down and picked up the block. It a massive hole was bored through the center, causing the top to be torn open and the sides bulged out.

"pretty badass, don't you think? You SPARTAN's can fire the gun without any problem, but for everyone else, you'll have to wear this special gauntlet to actually use it. Well, I my time is now up, so, I'll leave you all alone." Brown said. When they left, everyone continued gathering their gear.

"still can't believe that bastard actually busted out. Must've taken years to plan it all out." Buck muttered.

"well, he did spent ten years locked up. Plenty of time to rally the prisoners and escape." Romeo muttered, putting various pieces of his leg armor on. Everyone was busy putting their old uniforms and armor on for their mission to rescue Dr. Halsey. John noticed something odd on Carter's back.

"um, Commander, what's that on your back?" John asked. The SPARTAN simply smirked.

"Kat." he said. The two got close and wrapped their arms around each other. John instantly knew why; whenever the two were boning each other, Kat would drag her fingers across his back. That accounted for the eight scars running across his back.

"I'm surprised you haven't got her pregnant yet." John grumbled, ripping his clothes off. Everyone gasped once they saw how badly injured he was.

"Jeezus, what the hell happened to you in there?" Chernov asked. John's entire torso, front and back, was completely covered in bruises. His skin wasn't the normal color of human skin, it was all blue and black. Scars that lined up with stab wounds littered his entire body, several of them weren't even finished healing. It was clear that he had gone through more than his fair share of fights in the gulag, they just never seen him this wounded before.

"you like what you see?" John smirked as he opened up his old Mk. IV armor.

"um, were you ever, you know….. Raped?" Dempsey ever so slowly asked.

"no, I was never raped. Four months after you guys put there, someone tried to. Tried to do it right the shower. He ended up eating food through a straw for the rest of his life. After that, no one tried to fuck with me." John said with a angry smirk.

"so where'd you get all those cuts and scars?" Woods asked.

"I'm the only SPARTAN ever to be imprisoned at Vorkuta, do the math." John snarled as he put his armor on and left the armory. Once he was gone,

"think we can take him?" Carter asked.

"probably not. Now that he's out, he'll be very paranoid and watching our every move, just waiting for us attack him." Price said observantly.

"you said you were in a gulag once. What were you like after you were out?" Veronica asked.

"remember that this was back in 2016, the beginning of World War III, okay? At the time, the war was just barely starting so I had to focus on my job. Which was basically killing Russians. No offense."

"none taken. Asshole." all the Russians in the squad replied. Which were Grigori Weaver, Nikolai Belinsky, Victor Reznov, Dimitri Petrenko, Chernov, Catherine-B320, and Marco 'Nikolai' Ramius.

"after that, I ended up in Pelican dropship and ended up fighting the Covenant instead." Price simply shrugged at that.

"but were you very paranoid, always looking behind your shoulder?" Roebuck asked.

"I honestly wish I could say that. But after I arrived in the Pelican, the next thing I remembered was John telling us that he we were the best of the best, that he was giving us another chance. Sorry, but I can't help you on that." Price said.

"I've been in a Gulag." Mason said.

"you never mentioned it." Jun said.

"never thought I had to. Anyway, after I broke out of Vorkuta, I felt very-"

"what did you just call your gulag?" Kat interrupted.

"what?"

"the gulag you broke out of, what was it called?"

"Vorkuta. Why does that matter? They're separated about a thousand years, does it matter? Anyway, when I busted out, I was very paranoid. I was always looking behind my shoulder, in the shadows, behind cars, trucks, mailboxes, anything that could hide anyone, I took a double-glance. I wasn't gonna go back there, especially after what Dragovich, Kravchenko, and Steiner did to me." Mason said, shivering a bit.

"well, the President did say he would take care of him. Problem is, I don't trust him." Carter said.

"you're not the only one who doesn't trust him." Kennedy said, loading his China Lake. No one trusted President Millard; none of them believed he would 'take care' of John-117.

"Commander, get the 141 ready. Head down to the hanger deck and prep the Pelicans for an evac. Dr. Halsey says she doesn't want to risk docking our ship and the space station together. As for you, Master Chief, keep your shit together. I know your angry and out looking for revenge. Keep in your quarters, there's no room for it anywhere else on the ship." Captain Keyes said. Despite that John had effectively been washed out of the military, Jacob still called him by his former rank of Master Chief Petty Officer.

"yes sir, captain." John said sarcastically.

"and if it's any consolation, Chief, I was against your imprisonment."

"pfft, yeah right. If you were, you'd blasted your way in with the Morning Sun and busted me out. But I think I got the job done pretty good." John snarled angrily.

"just follow your orders. You'll be receiving them soon." Keyes said a little angrily. John looked down at the data-chip he held in his hands. _Cortana_…. How could he ever explain to her what had happened to him? He felt the best thing was just come out straight and tell her the whole truth. He put the chip in his head and felt the same, ice-chill feeling travel down his spine. He missed that feeling so much. He expected Cortana to be very angry at him, like when he killed Silva and his men with Nova 6 back on the Halo ring.

"Cortana, I'm just gonna say it straight, why I wasn't there for the past ten years. The 141 and Adm. Hood betrayed me and locked me away in a gulag. I just barely busted out."

"what?" was the intelligent reply.

"I would never lie to you. I'm telling you the truth. The Task Force 141 and Admiral Hood betrayed me; locked me up in a gulag and left me there to rot for the past 10 years. I just recently busted out."

"THOSE BASTARDS!"

"now that's the Cortana I know." John muttered with a knowing smile.

"HOW COULD THEY DO THAT TO YOU?! YOU WERE THEIR CO FOR THIRTY YEARS AND THEN THEY DECIDE TO STAB YOU IN THE BACK?!"

"okay, did they keep everything from you? If they did, that would explain why you're so pissed off." John said. Before they could continue,

"alright, we're depressurizing the hanger bay right now. Commander, take the 141 in that facility and get Halsey out, along with any other personal that might've survived. Report what the hell is going on over there, we might use that to our advantage to prevent anything else like this. Good luck. Captain Keyes out."

"roger that, Captain. We'll get her out. Alright people, lock and load! We don't know what to expect over there, so be on your guard!" Carter shouted out. What he really meant was, _stay on your guard, we don't know what the Chief will do. Lethal force is authorized to bring him down_. The massive bay doors opened up and depressurized. The Pelicans lifted from the floor and headed to the ONI science facility. It appeared to be gently listing off to the side. There were also Pelicans that simply floated around the station.

"wonder what the hell happened here that required our presence." Emile muttered.

"we'll find out soon enough." Hudson replied, cocking his rifle.

"ONI Outpost 47-Alpha, this is Pelican 183, requesting permission to dock." there was no reply.

"something's not right. Okay, we're landing with or without their permission. Get ready." Carter ordered. Once the dropships touched down,

"move out! Go, go, go!" Carter barked. The 141 jumped out of their crafts and took defensive positions across the hanger bay.

"okay, no enemy combatants. Nor any ONI personal. Captain, this is Sierra-259. We've just touched down in the hanger bay. The station's compliments of Pelicans are just floating outside. We're moving deeper into the facility."

"roger that, Commander."

"alright, keep your eyes open. You're free to engage, but be _very_ selective." the Task Force crept through the darkened corridors and hallways of the facility.

"okay, anyone wanna tell me why the lights are having trouble staying on? And why there's blood marks all over the walls and floor?" Dempsey asked.

"keep your head together, corporal." Carter growled.

"I agree with him, this looks rather familiar. Kinda like when Der Riese went to hell back in '45." Richtofen muttered. The group then stopped.

"what did you just say?" Kat warned the Nazi to pick his next words carefully. He didn't heed the warning.

"this place looks a lot like when Der Riese suffered the break-out. Blood all over the place, escape vehicles just sitting there, the lights barely working, all tale-tale signs of a zombie outbreak where the inhabitants simply panicked and ran, unlike us where we shoot the shit outta them." Richtofen said calmly.

"you're saying zombies are the cause of this?" Jorge asked.

"it's a distinct possibility. If what the records and rumors about Dr. Halsey are true, then it's extremely possible that she's experimenting with the dead. It's more than likely that that bitch stole the records from our ship, but never bothered to look very closely at them." Richtofen said a little angrily.

"alright, we're here to gather evidence of what happened here. But I'll keep that in mind. Jorge take point-OPEN FIRE, BRING HIM DOWN!" Carter suddenly yelled. A shadow moved across the corridor up ahead, catching the attention of the super-soldier. A wall of fiery lead and grenades flew towards the being, killing it instantly.

"Jun, go check it out." Carter ordered.

"it's a zombie, that's for sure. But it ain't like any zombie we've ever seen before." Jun reported, bringing the creature back. It was very gangly wearing only green shorts. It's face was grotesque; an over-sized angler fish-like mouth was in it's place. On eyes, nose, nothing.

"hmm. These must be Dr. Maxis' failed experiments." Richtofen gleefully muttered to himself.

"you're gonna explain that to me later. Alright, let's move. At this point, everyone's hostile. John, take Cortana and find the nearest data-port, download whatever you can from this station. Let's find out what happened here." Carter ordered.

"yes sir." John snarled. The hatred in his voice was very recognizable. He did his duty, however, and left the squad.

"you don't care, do you?" Kat asked.

"nope. This is what we're gonna do, find Halsey and get her out. Leave the Chief behind if we can. Let's move." Carter ordered.

"sir, if I may, we stick together, we're gonna be a very tempting target for the zombies, even with our new weapons. I suggest we split apart. We'll be smaller groups, so the zombies will have to split up. Not to mention, we'll cover more ground and find Halsey faster." Price suggested.

"good point. Alright, we're splitting up. Keep your comms open; just give a holler if you need help." Carter ordered. As the 141 split up into different, smaller groups, John and Cortana were all alone. Which is what they wanted. They ran into a large room which was covered with blood and body parts.

"I don't like the picture I'm painting." John muttered as he put Cortana in a holo-tank. Her naked form appeared, eliciting a perverted smile on his face.

"stop that, it's not like I don't know what goes on in your head." Cortana said. That only caused John to laugh; he figured out a long time ago that Cortana hacked into his memories and found out all the perverted wet dreams he had of her.

"alright, let's stay focused. The squad's talking about zombies being the cause."

"and you wanna know if that's true. Gimme a sec." Cortana said. She quickly gathered a copy of the station's entire database and downloaded it all into her.

"you get it all?"

"yes, I did. No, that can't be possible." Cortana said, confused.

"what's wrong?"

"we gotta get the hell outta this place right now." she said very fast.

"come again?"

"it's zombies alright. Dr. Halsey's been experimenting with creating super-soldier zombies, probably trying to salve her conscience from the SPARTAN program."

"why would she do that?" John asked, now confused as well.

"I don't know. We gotta warn the rest of the squad before-"

"BRING IT, MAGGOT SACKS!" Dempsey hollered angrily. Gunfire erupted immediately after that.

"before that happens. Alright, let's get outta here." John resigned. Even though he felt leaving the 141 to die at the hands of the zombies was a fair compromise on his opinion, he couldn't bring himself to leave them behind. He grabbed Cortana and ran out of the room. He found Dempsey, Nikolai, Takeo and Richtofen doing what they do best; slaughtering zombies. For some reason, however, these zombies were a lot tougher then he remembered. Definitely super-soldier zombies. But there was something familiar about them. Most zombies came with clammy gray skin with glowing orange eyes. These zombies had a pale yellow skin with dull, matted eyes. It instantly connected.

"she's using Flood DNA to augment these zombies!" John said horrifically.

"well that would explain why they heal up fast!" Dempsey retorted sarcastically, chucking a grenade into the group. The grenade went off, but only a small chunk of the zombies went down; the rest simply absorbed the blast and continued unabated.

"these zombies aren't bursting into flames! NOOOOOO! I'M ALL OUT OF VODKA!" Nikolai screamed in horror. Sighing, John charged forward and smashed into them, using his super-human strength to deal with the super-soldier Flood zombies.

"we gotta find Halsey and get her out, right now." John said.

"amen to that. Oh yeah, I need some more vodka." Nikolai muttered, drinking a bottle.

"let's move. Cortana, do you have a lock on Dr. Halsey?" John asked.

"I do. She in a safe-room on the far side of the station. Between her and us is nothing but zombies."

"shit. Alright, let's get moving. We got a lot of work to do." John ordered. So far, Dempsey, Nikolai, Takeo and Richtofen were the only one's alive from the 141. For all he knew, everyone else had been infected. Rounding a corner, they found more Crawler Zombies waiting for them. They were the easy ones to kill; the regular zombies were more harder and tougher to kill, even though they had armor-piercing incendiary weaponry. They only managed to clear about 2 meters, and they had spent through 57% of all their ammunition. The five gave Halsey her due; she made really strong zombies.

"we're gonna run outta ammo before we get even close." Richtofen sighed.

"we don't have a choice. Unless… do we still have enough time to get back to the Morning Sun and grab some Wunderwaffe's?" John asked.

"nope."

"dammit. Alright, keep moving. Fight hand-to-hand if you have to." John muttered. No way zombies were gonna keep him from rescuing Dr. Halsey. After blasting their way through more zombies, they found Cpt. Dare's team, all covered in blood.

"where's everyone else?" John asked.

"we all split up, figured it'd give us a better chance at finding Halsey." Dare sighed.

"are you guys really that fucking stupid? Do you have any idea what the hell's going on in here?!"

"no, do you?" Romeo challenged.

"Halsey's making super-soldier zombies augmented with Flood DNA, our weapons can't kill these fuckers instantly!" John said.

"she's fucking insane." Dutch sighed.

"we're sticking together, I don't care what Carter says." John growled. The group fought their way through more zombies through the destroyed station, wondering where everyone else was. They rounded a corner and met up with Noble Team, with Dr. Halsey in the middle, surrounded by the SPARTAN's.

"John." Dr. Halsey said, glad that he was now here.

"what the hell are you thinking, doctor, augmenting zombies with fucking Flood DNA? Are you really that fucking stupid?!" John hollered. That was not what Halsey expected, not at all.

"and don't tell me that you didn't know, you got as much experience fighting the Flood as I do!" John snarled at the SPARTAN's.

"actually, we found that out some time ago when the zombies started sprouting tentacles." Carter said calmly.

"okay then. Where's everyone else?" John asked.

"I sent them back to the hanger bay."

"alright. Let's get the hell outta here." John growled.

"is there anyone else?" Veronica asked.

"she's the only survivor." Kat muttered.

"fucking A." John whispered to himself. The strike force headed back to the hanger where they found the Pelicans. They also found the Marine and Army Trooper strike forces that had been sent in before them, all infected and turned into Flood Zombies. The 141's Pelicans were in the air, blasting away at the new threat.

"hey, Nikolai, bring our ship down, will ya? We found Dr. Halsey!" Carter yelled.

"yeah, yeah, yeah, gimme a sec." the Russian pilot muttered. A Pelican turned around, her weapons still firing. The rear hatch opened up, the SPARTAN's and ODST's climbed inside, their package with them.

"alright, let's get outta here." John ordered. The Pelicans left the destroyed bay, leaving the doomed station behind.

"Captain, this is the Commander, we got the package. Request a fire-salvo on the station." Carter reported.

"what, you can't do that, we can't destroy that facility!" Halsey protested.

"ONI can send me the bill later. Captain?"

"copy your last, Commander?"

"the station's been overrun by Flood Zombies. I'll explain later. I want that station destroyed."

"alright, I'll see what I can do." Captain Keyes said. On the bridge,

"Ensign Lovell, bring the ship about. Co-ordinates 48 by three-five-seven."

"roger that. 48 by 3-5-7." the massive warship moved according to her knew flight path.

"Lt. Hikowa, lock onto the station with our Mk. 25's. gimme a firing solution once we're locked on." Captain Keyes ordered. Lt. Hikowa had actually refused her orders to catch some sleep, saying that she was the best tactical officer onboard and that Captain Keyes needed her. He couldn't argue with that. Once the 141 was back onboard, however, Dr. Brown or Richtofen would take her place.

"we have a weapons lock. Ready to fire on your command."

"are the Pelicans out of the blast radius?"

"yes sir."

"fire."

The Mk. 25 Anti-ship Auto turrets rotated into position and took aim. The barrels then rasped out their lethal payload, slamming into the barely shielded ONI station. The explosive-tipped rounds detonated and vaporized the station, killing all it's inhabitants.

"didn't have a choice, Dr. Halsey. We'll see to it that you'll get back to Earth safely." Captain Keyes said once the Pelicans were back onboard.

"Ensign, take us home."

"yes sir." Lovell replied. The slipstream event opened up, but another one appeared next to it. An ONI prowler came out.

"cancel the trip home, ensign. Lt. Dominique, gimme contact with that Prowler.

"your on, sir."

"ONI Prowler, this is Captain Keyes, state your purpose for being here."

"sorry we're late, Captain Keyes. Did you get Dr. Halsey out?"  
>"yes, we did."<p>

"I have orders to take her back to Earth for a debriefing about the events on that station, sir." the Prowler's captain said.

"of course." Jacob said, making him wonder more what happened on that facility. Halsey piloted the Pelican herself to the Prowler. Once she was onboard, the ONI warship cloaked and disappeared from view.

"Commander, I need a debriefing on what happened over there."

"Halsey was making super-soldier zombies heavily augmented with Flood DNA. They broke containment and infected everyone, she's the sole survivor. Our new guns didn't do a damn thing against them." that said it all.

"thank you, Commander." he said rather tight-lipped. He had a hard time believing Halsey would actually do that.

"so, what are our orders?" Carter asked, walking onto the bridge.

"the Prowler's transmitting them. Says that we're to meet with the Shadow of Intent at Sector 23 in the Gamma-Hydra Sector. Something about Thel' Vadem and the Task Force 141."

"he is an official member of the squad. Would make sense to bring him along now that we're back in business. Alright, get us there." Jacob ordered, smoking his pipe. His mind kept on wandering back to why Halsey would experiment with the Flood. She knew how dangerous it was. What the hell was she doing over there? The slipstream event opened up again, this time going to what everyone called 'Ambush Nebula.' It was called that because Kig-Yar pirates would hide in wait deep in the nebula and ambush any unsuspecting starship.

"Dr. Richtofen, I need you up on the bridge, ASAP. Lt. Hikowa, get to bed. That's an order." Keyes sternly suggested.

"yes sir." she said. She headed for the door when the teleporter ruptured, spewing out the Nazi doctor.

"you need me?" he calmly asked.

"take the tactical station."

"yes sir." they had a lot of time on their hands. The 141 was spending it out to get rid of the Chief, now that he was back in their lives. John was spending the time how he could get back at the 141 for betraying him, and Cortana was spending the time helping him as well. In the sickbay, Dr. Brown was busy going over the medical records of John-117, now that he was back in the group.

"wait a minute, that's not possible." he muttered. Walking to the middle of the room, he pulled of a large holographic representation of the SPARTAN.

"where did he get these scars, all along his arms and legs? Hell, looks like someone cut into his chest as well. Oh my God, that's not possible, it can't be." he said softly. His investigation was cut short, however, when the ship exited slipspace, rather violently. Up in the bridge,

"what was that?" Jacob asked.

"uh, looks like some form of plasma fire brought us out. Okay, that's not good. I'm seeing five Jackal Raiders coming toward us at high speeds."

"ready the MAC cannon, prepare to fire on my command."

"um, sir? We can't fire our MAC cannon, turrets or missiles while in the nebula."

"well, what the hell can we use?" he snarled.

"our Pulse Laser Turrets and Plasma Torpedoes, sir. We can use those." the Nazi replied.

"right. Gimme a lock with the torpedoes and turrets. Chew away at their shields and hit 'em hard, right in the nose." Keyes ordered. The turrets opened fire, weakening the shields to the point of nonexistence.

"their shields are down, sir. They're fleeing, sir, they're retreating!"

"lock on plasma torpedoes, we're not gonna let them get away." several bright-blue Plasma Torpedoes rang out and slammed into the helpless Raiders, destroying them instantly.

"Raiders destroyed, sir." Richtofen reported.

"so, where's the Shadow of Intent?" Jacob wondered. A slightly scarred Covenant assault carrier loomed out of the clouds.

"there she is. Looks like we're getting a transmission right now." Dominique said.

"let's here it."  
>"dammit, Captain Keyes, why'd you destroy my scouts? I thought you were a Brute warship coming in!" Rtas yelled out.<p>

"sorry about destroying your ships, but I thought they were Jackal Pirates. If they had said anything before, then I wouldn't have destroyed them." Keyes said sternly.

"ah well, they're dead, so it doesn't matter. We received word that the Task Force 141 was sent on a new mission. Kaidon Vadem wanted to join them."

"he's welcome on the ship, but I'm afraid he's a little too late, we just finished our mission. But in regards for the 141, he'll have to come over here and be reinstated in the squad if he wants to fight with them."

"we can arrange that."

"is that why you said not to fire our main weapons?" Keyes asked.

"I had a hunch. Actually, you could fire every weapon while in the nebula, wouldn't effect anything." Richtofen said with a smile. The two mighty warships docked with each other, the 141 minus John and Cortana meeting Thel Vadem at the main airlock.

"good to have you back, Arby." Carter said with a smile.

"it's good to be back, but I thought I made it clear five years ago not to call me Arby anymore." Thel said.

"yeah, we know, but we still do it, just to tick you off." Carter said, breaking into a light chuckle.

"okay, if the family reunion is finished, I'd like to get underway. I just got new orders. I think it's best if the whole 141 meets me in the conference room for this." Captain Keyes ordered.

"hmm, must be really big orders if he wants the entire squad present." General Shepherd said.

"you have to come as well, Kaidon Vadem." Keyes' voice boomed over the comm. In the overly massive conference room,

"so, what are our orders?" Hudson asked, wiping down his rifle.

"we have orders to investigate several disappearances happening in the Gamma Sector, approximately 2.5 light-years beyond the edge of the now-destroyed Epsilon Eradini System. Apparently, several soldiers have been reported missing. UNSC HIGHCOM is ordering us to investigate the disappearances of these soldiers. Any leads, we're to follow and see what we cook up."

"do we know what unit these soldiers belong to? Are they Marines, Troopers, ODST's, maybe even SPARTAN's?" Emile asked.

"the only thing they sent is that these soldiers are called 'Simulation Troopers' and that they work for some secret military organization called Freelancer. Anyone familiar with that designation or term?" Keyes asked.

"no. And it wouldn't surprise me if ONI has been keeping secrets from us." Veronica said with a bit of disgust. Over the past 10 years, Veronica had actually been deeply considering resigning from the Office of Naval Intelligence.

"so, where did these soldiers disappear from?" Roebuck asked.

"someplace called Blood Gulch, that's all we know."

"Cortana, you downloaded a copy of that station's database. Any of what we listed off seem familiar to you?" Mickey asked.

"nope, the database didn't show up anything regarding an organization called Freelancer or a class of soldier called Simulation Troopers."

"do you know what Blood Gulch is, a canyon, a military base, any details or specifics we can use?" Makarov asked.

"never heard of it." came the short reply.

* * *

><p><strong>Again, hope you guys like it. Read and review, please!<strong>


	14. Chapter 13

**Disclaimer: I own nothing. Red vs Blue belong to Rooster Teeth. Call of Duty belongs to Infinity Ward and Treyarch. Halo belongs to Bungie, Microsoft Gaming Studios, and 343 Industries.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 13<p>

April 11th, 2563

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

Unidentified Planet

"alright, people, go down there, find any leads on the missing soldiers, and report it back to me." Captain Keyes said.

"shouldn't we have some backup for this? Where's your daughter, I heard she got a new command." Carter asked.

"she did, the UNSC _J. Ackerson_, a new Marathon-class cruiser. She's currently patrolling what's left of our colonies with a small scouting fleet to put down any Innie activities. For now, we're on our own. And if you're wondering what happened to Captain Cutter and his ship, that's a little above my pay grade. Find out what happened to those soldiers."

"roger that, we'll find out." Carter ordered. The hanger bay doors opened and the squad's Huey helicopters flew out, heading down toward the planet below them.

"hey, you think that's Blood Gulch?" John asked, pointing to a large canyon in the ground. Inside were two rather antiquated bases on the far end, with UNSC-issued vehicles on the far ends.

"probably is. Let's go down there, find out what's going on." Carter ordered. The Hueys dived down and took up overwatch over the canyon, not wanting to attract any attention from anyone down there.

"Kat, hack their comms. I wanna see what they're doing down there." Carter ordered. They spotted a man in silver armor with a yellow trim, walking from the base on the far left side of the canyon to the far right. Over the comms,

"come in, Command." the man said.

"hello Washington. We have you, how was the investigation at Blue Base?" came a female voice. This was probably Command, although the 141 had no idea what this Command was. They figured Blue Base was the building on the far side.

"enlightening. Going to try the Red Base now, I'm hoping things there will be a little more...normal." the man finished. Over the comms, they heard a man with a gruff voice in a southern accent speak up as a cardboard cut-out of a soldier clad in pink armor popped out.

"halt, in the name of the red, I mean "lightish red' army. This base is operating at full capacity. And if you come in here, you're gonna get in to a big, uh slap-fight!"

"I'm gonna have to call you back." the man said. The redneck voice returned.

"don't come any further, ooh la la."

The silver-and-yellow soldier continued walking toward the other base when a cardboard cut-out of a maroon-clad soldier came out. The southern voice returned.

"this is your last warning, stay out! I love math!"

"what in the…"

"your only hope of survival is to kiss my commander's ass!"

The unknown soldier continued walking, going past a cardboard cut-out of a orange soldier that looked as if it had been used for target practice. A lot of target practice.

"and this is another warning: I know the other warning was supposed to be last, but I never listen to orders, 'cause I'm too lazy and stupid! And ugly. Did I mention ugly?"

"this is going to be a waste of time, I can tell already." the silver soldier sighed. A soldier then clad in red armor holding what appeared to be a M90 shotgun popped up.

"yah, freeze intruder! Stop yer intrudin' right there." the soldier demanded.

"who made these things?" the silver man asked.

"I did." the red soldier replied.

"wait, you're real?"

"of course I am. You fell for a classic misdirection. I still got it." the other man chuckled. A soldier in brown armor walked up from Red Base.

"Esta todo bien aquí?" he asked.

"we're fine, Lopez. Just caught myself a dirty Blue. How many does that make this week?" the redneck soldier asked.

"uno." the Mexican soldier replied.

"yahtzee. We're on a hot streak!"

"uh, I'm not actually a Blue. I'm from Command." the silver soldier said, hoping to defuse the situation.

"command, no kidding. I didn't think we were due for inspection."

"you're not. I was hoping you could tell me about the soldiers transferred out of this outpost."

"you mean Grif and Simmons? Those traitors. I told 'em not to go! The battle here isn't even over yet!" the redneck soldier yelled.

"um, it looks over to me." the other soldier replied.

"not while there's a single Blue left in this canyon. Which there is: a single Blue. Victory, or death."

"I see." the other man said, clearly uninterested.

"that's why I refused my relocation orders. Obviously Command wasn't thinking clearly." the redneck man said rather proudly.

"so, you're AWOL then."

"I uh... A-what?" apparently, he didn't know what AWOL meant.

"don't tell him anything until you talk to a lawyer! You have rights!" a female yellow soldier yelled out. She was perched on top of a large cliff on the canyon wall.

"I'm not a cop!" the silver soldier yelled.

"hey! Beat it ya little tramp! Ya see why I can't go?" the redneck asked.

"why not just attack her and win then? It would take about ten seconds."

"you're old and I hate you!" the female soldier screamed.

"that's the problem! I can't attack a girl. So we're locked, in an epic stalemate."

"you're kidding me."

"plus she's cookin' somethin' up. And I gotta be ready. I hear her runnin' training ops every night! I see them out there with their glow sticks and their tribal drum beats: oom chicka oom chicka oom chicka oom chicka." the redneck was obviously not the brightest star in the galaxy.

"well. This has been really... informative. But I need to find someone who has experience with artificial intelligence."

"alright. You want Caboose then. He got infected for a little while I think."

"great. Caboose! Do you know where he is?" the silver man asked, hopeful his trip wasn't in vain.

"of course. We intercepted the Blues' orders. I got it right here. Lopez!" he yelled.

"Sí."

"get this guy the Blue Team relocation orders." he ordered.

"Sí."

"Lopez probably converted it in to Spanish, so they might be a little hard to understand."

"yeah. They wouldn't be the first thing today." the silver man replied.

"shut up, cop!" the female soldier yelled. Up in the Huey's, Carter quickly cut the comm. Everyone then burst out laughing at the apparent stupidity of the soldiers down in the canyon.

"okay, Command has sent us on a lot of crazy missions, but this one probably tops them all!" Carter laughed.

"so, what we do we do, Carter?" Weaver laughed.

"okay, let's humor 'em. It's quite obvious it's a bunch of UNSC Marines who augmented their armor and believe they're in some sort of war. When we get done, we'll go back to the ship, report to the captain that there are no missing soldiers and go home. Man, this is gonna be funny." Carter laughed. After everyone got done laughing, the Huey's flew down into the canyon as the silver man left the canyon. The gunships landed around the red base, startling the two soldiers.

"whoa. Lopez, did that guy from Command call in reinforcements, cause I didn't hear anything."

"No, no he oído nada del otro soldado. Estos hombres y mujeres son, probablemente, otro grupo de soldados a partir de una estructura de mando militar diferente." Lopez said.

"huh, that's a pretty good theory there, Lopez. Obviously that dirty little punk from Command must have some sort of telepathic abilities to call in more soldiers. And we're badly outnumbered."

"my name's Commander Carter, Carter-A259. I've been sent here from UNSC HIGHCOM to investigate the disappearance of the soldiers stationed here."

"what, more soldiers from Command? Wow, today must be my lucky day. Wait a minute, why are wearing blue armor, are you with the Blues?" the redneck asked. Carter simply chuckled at that.

"no, I'm not with the blues. I'm the commanding officer of the Task Force 141, the large group of soldiers you see behind me. As I said, I've been sent here to investigate the disappearance of the soldiers formerly stationed here."

"ah, you must mean Grif and Simmons. Damn traitors, I told 'em not to go!"

"let me guess, because the 'battle' in this canyon isn't over yet?" Carter smirked.

"no. I mean yes, how'd you know that?"  
>"I hacked your comms so my team and I heard very word you and the other soldier said."<p>

"wow. I didn't know our comms could be hacked like that. That's pretty badass. Well, something did happen a year back or so that involved time travel and a bunch of rogue Freelancers. You wanna take a look around, go ahead." the redneck said. The mention of time travel intrigued the 141; so far, the PFC onboard the UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun was the only thing in the universe capable of time travel. Did ONI manage to replicate that piece of technology?

"time travel. Yeah, we've had some experience with that. We'll take a look around, see if there's anything we can take back to our superiors." Carter said, now wondering what Blood Gulch really was. The 141 dispersed around Blood Gulch. The place looked as if it had suffered a major battle, what with all the shell casings and scorch marks around.

"looks like this place suffered a major battle. I'm gonna go in the base, see if there's anything Cortana can hack from their computers." John suggested.

"alright." Carter allowed. When he walked inside, he found that the base was very large.

"Cortana, judging from the state of the base, what would you think it's purpose was for?" John asked. From what they could tell, the base had three levels. The basement had only one door and what they could best describe as the garage door missing a chunk of the wall. The basement was large enough to hold a Scorpion tank and two Warthogs. The main floor was pretty basic, with a mess hall, an infirmary, two bathrooms, several bunks, and a large common room. The roof had two ramps leading up to it with two positions for machine gun emplacements. They also found what appeared to be a reverse engineered Covenant Gravity Lift in the middle of the base. There was also a pitifully small armory of outdated weapons, such as MA5B AR's and BR55 rifles. Almost all of them were kept in rather awful shape.

"well?"

"judging from the state of the base, I would say it was built for it's occupants to wage a small war. Plug me into that console over there, let me see what I can pick up." Cortana said.

"alright. Cortana, does that man's armor look familiar to you? Like what the SPARTAN's wear?"

"what, MJOLNIR?"  
>"yeah. Problem is, he's only around the size of an average marine, and he doesn't show any physical abilities of a SPARTAN super-soldier."<p>

"yeah, I've seen that as well."

"you think it might be a new armor for non-SPARTAN's?"

"if that were true, what would these soldiers be doing way out here instead of being on the front lines?"

"maybe the computers hold something that can answer our question."

"actually, they don't."

"come again?"  
>"apparently, this base has very little information we can use. Mostly re-assignment orders for the soldiers stationed in this canyon."<p>

"you think we should follow those orders, see where they lead?"  
>"I wouldn't suggest that. Even though you and I kinda hate everyone else's guts right now, I feel our best chance is to stay together."<p>

"alright. We'll stay. Besides, it might give me a chance to get back at them." John said, putting the data-chip back in his helmet. He went outside to find the 141 and the redneck soldier chatting.

"so, what's your name?" John asked.

"his name's Sarge. Doesn't go by anything else other than that." Carter said.

"hmm. Do you know what these bases were built for?" John asked.

"of course, they were built for the war against the evil Blues! I thought everyone knew that!" Sarge yelled out.

"so what about him?" Castro asked.

"who, Lopez? Ah, he's just being himself as usual. Always doing good work and making sure nothing goes wrong."

"so why does he speak Spanish?"  
>"because the language chip I put in him kinda got scratched, so he's left speaking Spanish."<p>

"what do you mean, language chip?"  
>"he's a robot. Why do you ask?" Sarge proudly asked.<p>

"robot. Hey, didn't Section III experiment with robotic soldiers seven or eight years back?" Jun asked.

"they did. It was a failure, they scrapped the project." Veronica said.

"so, do you have any knowledge about any previous battles, we spotted plenty of scorch marks and bullet shells around the canyon." John said.

"yeah, he explained that. Something about rogue Freelancer agents and rogue Elites causing havoc in the canyon." Carter said.

"hmm. You'll understand if I don't believe you, Commander." John snarled, walking away.

"what's his problem?" Sarge asked.

"10 years ago we locked him away in a gulag. He just barely busted out and now he wants to kill us." Kat said.

"hmm." Sarge said, eyeing the 141 suspiciously. A call then came in over the wireless.

"this is Command calling Red Base, come in Red Base." the female operative said.

"Kat, get a copy of all this." Carter whispered.

"this is Blood Gulch Outpost Number One." Sarge said, walking to the top of the base.

"Agent Washington has reassembled the blues."

"I knew it! I knew he was a dirty, little blue!" Sarge yelled angrily.

"gather your team, we want you to stop Agent Washington at all costs. This is level one directive. Good luck, Red Base."

"hey wait a minute. Any word on that soldier poison I ordered?"

"no. Good luck, Red Base."

"what about the robot nuts?"  
>"no. good luck, Red Base. Command out."<p>

"well you don't have to get so testy about it! Hello? HELLO! THIS THING GETS TERRIBLE RECEPTION! ONLY HAVE ONE BAR! HELLO! CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW? STUPID 4G NETWORK! LOPEZ!" Sarge screamed, walking down the ramp.

"Sí ." the Spanish robot replied.  
>"that was Red Command."<p>

"Sí. Yo sé."

"were you listening to my call?"  
>"Puedo grabar todas nuestras llamadas para garantizar la calidad."<p>

"they said that those dirty Blues are up to no good!"

"Esa llamada sonaba extrana a mí."

"I agree, we gotta stop 'em. No matter what the cost."

"Alguien caricio otra llamada."

"you're right, I shouldn't be here flapping my gums, I need to shake a tail feather!"

"Sí, usted se va para su misión falsa…"

"I gotta reassemble the team! And I know I can't get Donut, so that leaves me Simmons… and Grif." Sarge growled malevolently towards the orange cutout.

"…y quienquiera enviado la llamada le matará."

"ah, good point! Maybe I'll get lucky and Grif will already have been killed! Not in a glorious manner like battle of course, but doing something humiliating and menial! Maybe he drowned in a toilet while cleaning it!"

"Pendejo."

"I know, I know, I'm hoping for too much. Lopez, pack my gear! I gotta get going!"

"Se hace ya. Lo embalo diario deseó que usted se fuera." Lopez pulled out an old suitcase and threw it next to the Huey gunships.

"good old Lopez. Dependable as always. Now Lopez-"

"Oh dios... por favor. No quiero tener un momento."

"I know we've had a few good times together-"

"No haga esto."

"you've always relied on my guidance and protection."

"El adolescente le derrotó."

"but you're gonna be on your own, now."

"Bueno."

"I prepared you for the world as best I could."

"Usted me programó en Español!"

"so take care of yourself. And always remember, that I'll be thinking of you."

"Voy a ir vedar que la el segundo es tu van. Apenas como ... Y …"

"nope. No words, Lopez. I'll see you again. In a better place. Adios, amigo. Adios."

"Vámonos viejo hombre estúpido."

"I'll miss you too, Lopez. Every single day. I promised myself I wouldn't cry!" Sarge cried.

"Menos hablando. Yéndose."

"me too, Lopez! Me too." Sarge declared, climbing inside his Warthog.

"El pedal está a la derecha!" Lopez yelled.

"you guys wanna come along, help bring back Red Team and kill those bastard Blues?" Sarge asked.

"meh, what the hell. Let's humor 'em. We haven't seen much action over the past 10 years, we might get to shoot somebody if we follow him." Carter muttered.

"so we're following him?" Chernov asked.

"yup. Sarge! We're going with you! We'll be airborne, you just take us to where Grif and Simmons are!" Carter yelled. The Huey's took to the air and flew out of the canyon. About 25 kilometers away, a massive steel door in the ground opened up and a single Warthog came out.

"now let's go find Simmons and Grif!" Sarge yelled, flooring the Warthog.

"Sarge, if these re-assignment orders are correct, then there's no way you'll find them in a Warthog."

"you're right. But this is the LZ for any ships coming from Earth to deliver new equipment and weapons to our bases to continue the war." Sarge said rather proudly.

"yes, well, while your war is fine and all, we're gonna need your help. Do you have any contact with any space vessel?" Kat asked a little impatiently.

"not really, but all I have to do is contact Command, they'll send a ship for me."

"we got our own ship, you can use that. Captain Keyes, we're kinda running a little behind on schedule. A grand entrance would not go amiss." Buck said a little sarcastically.

"I'm the one giving the orders around here, Gunnery sergeant. Remember that, but I'll bring the ship down to pick you up."

"you got a ship coming down?" Sarge asked.  
>"yeah, should be arriving just about… now." Brown said, looking at his watch and pointing behind him exactly as the Morning Sun pulled up. Her massive engines were blowing dust everywhere.<p>

"wow. You guys sure carry the big stuff." Sarge said in awe as he stared at the supercarrier.

"that's what she said." Nikolai muttered, causing the 141 to laugh.

"alrighty then, let's go find Simmons and Grif and kill those bastard blues!" Sarge yelled, jumping off his Warthog and climbing on Mason's gunship. The Hueys took to the skies and landed in Hanger Bay 14. The massive engines roared to life carried the ship off into the stars.

"so, where's this Rat's Nest?" Chernov asked, slinging his rifle.

"huh, oh yeah. Rat's Nest. Here are the co-ordinates, that's where Simmons and Grif were relocated to."

"you mean reassigned. Alright, I'll take it to the bridge and we'll see where we go from there." Brown said, stepping into a teleporter and whisking himself away to the bridge.

"what the heck was that?" Sarge asked.

"it's a teleporter, we use 'em to move heavy equipment around the ship. Captain, what's our ETA for Rat's Nest?" Carter asked, his hand on the intercom.

"I ordered you to investigate the disappearing soldiers."

"we found a lead, it goes to Rat's Nest. Captain, I can't explain everything here, I'm gonna have to meet with you in your office, I'll explain everything there."

"alright. I'll set a course for Rat's Nest anyway. See what we can't pick up there."

April 11th, 2563

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

Slipspace Event

"alright, speak up. What do you think is happening down there?" Captain Keyes asked.

"we over listened a radio message between the staff sergeant we brought up and an unidentified man sent from Command, whatever that is. They said something about personal being familiar with AI's, and some war between two factions called Red and Blue. He also said his soldiers were re-assigned to another base called Rat's Nest. I don't think there are any soldiers' disappearing, sir. I think this is just something ONI's cooking up, maybe a new program to create a new breed of soldier, something. I don't know what it is, but I feel that if we stay with this staff sergeant, we might pick up more pieces of the puzzle."

"alright. Stay with him, wherever he goes, you go. Find out about what's going on here. We'll be reaching Rat's Nest pretty soon now." Keyes said, looking at a computer screen on his desk.

April 11th, 2563

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

Rat's Nest

Rat's Nest turned out to be a very large space station orbiting a gas planet with winds so strong they literally blew away any colony ship attempting to terraform the surface.

"alright, what do we got?" Keyes asked, walking on the bridge. On the main window, a holo table in the middle of the bridge, a representation of Rat's Nest appeared.

"station comes with 5 levels. On opposite sides of the station look what appear to be bases. Same basic standard layout of the ones in Blood Gulch, but these come with standard brigs. Probably for holding enemy soldiers." Kat reported.

"any vehicles inside?"  
>"there are about 6 corridors intersecting each other all around Rat's Nest. All are large enough to squeeze in a Scorpion Tank. The main hanger deck is large enough for two Pelicans. Probably where more Red and Blue soldiers are dropped off. On the Blue side, I'm seeing a Scorpion tank and two Warthogs, all of them having been destroyed."<p>

"Cortana, any life signs in there?"  
>"I'm reading several. On the Red base, I'm not reading any signs on the Blue Base."<p>

"alright. Get a Pelican ready and drop the staff sergeant off. What's his name, by the way?"  
>"he doesn't have one, just goes by Sarge."<p>

"right. Just get that Pelican ready." Keyes ordered. A Pelican loaded with a standard Warthog flew from the ship to the station, landing in the bay.

"hello? Hello? Anyone here? Hmm, that's strange. Well, time to find Grif and Simmons." Sarge declared, grabbing his Warthog and driving through the base.

"Sarge, anything in there yet? Any signs of your old unit?" Carter asked.

"hello? Anybody here? Anybody alive? No, good. Blue sucks! Heh, I didn't think Simmons and Grif would've switched to Blue team, but if they did, might explain why they all died."

"Sarge, any sign of your old team?" Carter asked again.

"I'm working on it. Nothing but a bunch of dead Blues. I'm working my way over to the red base. Blue sucks!" he yelled as he drove around.

"I'm getting the feeling this guy might be a little brain damaged." Captain Keyes said slowly.

"I figured that out a very long time ago. We're just humoring him, remember?" Carter asked.

"I hope you know what your doing." Keyes sighed. Over the radio, they heard the sound of gunshots.

"Sarge, what's going on?" Carter asked.

"Simmons, Grif! There you are!" Sarge exclaimed.

"are we dead?" a male soldier asked.

"well if we are, the hell looks just like the Army. Big surprise there." another man replied sarcastically.

"I've been looking everywhere for you." Sarge said to his former squad.

"Sarge?" the first man asked.

"yeah, what?" the second man asked.

"what in the hell are you two doing?"

"we're being executed by our own men, sir." the first man asked.

"well cut it out. Command's got a secret mission for us, we got some back up as well."

"who the hell's this guy?" another voice was heard.

"oh, what's this? Insubordination?" Sarge asked. The sound of a shotgun butt connecting with a human skull was heard, then the sound of a body collapsing on the floor was heard after that.

"heyah! Come on, you two, let's get a move on! Where's your commanding officer?" Sarge asked.

"he's right there." the first man said.

"where, behind Grif?"

"sergeant Grif is our C.O., sir."

"your sergeant has the same name as Grif? That's a disturbing coincidence."

"no no, listen to me. Grif is our commander. He was promoted to sergeant when you refused to relocate with us."

"but who's in charge?" Sarge cried out.

"sergeant Grif!" the first man replied, getting a little ticked off.

"okay, I can hear you saying words, but it's like they don't match up in a way that make sense. Did you have a stroke or something?"

"Grif is a sergeant. He's the same rank as you now."

"that's how I'm talking about. Where is he?"

"he's right there!"

"so, he's invisible." Sarge concluded.

"dude, I don't think he's even physically capable of understanding what you're saying to him." the second man said. They guessed that this man was Grif.

"does this mean we get a new sergeant now? Good, cause this one sucks." the same man came back, the one who was knocked out. Sarge hit him again.

"never talk that way about a superior." Sarge growled.

"did Sarge just call me a superior? I heard it, Simmons is a witness!" Grif exclaimed.

"I don't wanna get involved." Simmons sighed.

"what's going on in this outpost? Insubordination, invisible sergeants, Simmons has had a stroke!" Sarge yelled.

"it totally counts." Grif muttered.

"you two just get in the jeep. We're getting outta here, I'll explain everything on the way." Sarge ordered.

"shotgun!" Simmons yelled.

"I outrank you, get in the back." Grif ordered.

"fuck!" Simmons swore.

"son, tell your sergeant that I'm taking these two with me. He can call Command for verification."

"but your taking our sergeant!" the man replied.

"what? I can't hear you! Engine's too loud!" Sarge yelled as he drove away. On the Morning Sun, they cut the comm and everyone on the bridge laughed.

"okay, this mission just gets weirder and funnier all the time! We should go on more shit like this!" Carter laughed.

"okay, we need to keep our head in the game. Once they come back onboard, let's find these Blues and waste 'em." Keyes snickered.

"how are we gonna do that? They're probably long gone by now." Kat asked.

"they said something about infected AI's, right?"  
>"yeah…"<p>

"get on the broad wave and find anything concerning AI's and infections. Those are the only leads we have at the moment."

"sir, I'm getting something. I think this might help us."

"Recovery One, come in, level zero come in." a female voice was heard.

"go ahead, Command." the same male voice from the man Sarge was talking to at Blood Gulch was heard.

"Wash, we have a beacon."

"I'm getting it too. Do you have co-ordinates and an ID?" the man, Wash, asked.

"are you sure about this, I mean, this is how we can be-"

"Command, you're breaking up on me. Please repeat, how can what be-"

"I wasn't talking to you, Wash. And, your sure. Okay. It's Agent Maine."

"what?"  
>"please confirm last transmission, Agent Washington."<p>

"Maine, how can that be? If-"

"please confirm, Recovery One."  
>"yeah, it's him. It's the Meta."<p>

"what?" another male voice was heard.

"Command, gimme the co-ordinates now." Agent Washington replied. Static was then heard on the radio.

"Cortana, what's going on?" Keyes asked.

"looks like their radio transmission is being jammed. Looks like it was jammed right at the source."

"alright, cut off the hack."

"any idea what that might be?" Kat asked.

"I don't think we're dealing with missing soldiers any more. I don't know what's going on, and part of me just says to leave it alone and go home. However, I got a feeling that tells me we should investigate this even further. Try and decipher all this, everything that's going on with all these soldiers. It wouldn't surprise me if this is some sort of a military organization deep with in Section III of ONI. Cortana, can you trace the jam?" Captain Keyes asked.

"I've already done that. Looks like it was jammed at a large, abandoned power station. The planet's Archer II." Cortana confirmed.

"I thought that Archer II was abandoned during the war." Reznov wondered.

"it was."

"so what are these troopers doing at an abandoned power station on a destroyed planet?" Jorge wondered.

"alright. This where our lead takes us, this is where we're gonna go. Helmsman, get us to Archer II."

"yes sir." they had no idea that the soldiers they overheard got there first because the ship they used came equipped with a modified slipstream engine, modified heavily with Forerunner technology, so it was faster than the Morning Sun.

April 12th, 2563

Archer II

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

In the hanger bay,

"what are you three doing?" Carter asked.

"um, we need to borrow one of your jeeps." Sarge admitted.

"outta the question."

"oh, come on! You guys are loaded with these jeeps, you can't spare one? Wait, don't answer that question. If you don't spare us one, then that means we won't have to work. Sorry Sarge, they won't give us a Jeep." Grif said.

"oh no, by all means, you can have it. We got plenty of 'em." Carter said with a smile.

"you see Grif, I knew I got you back for something." Sarge said happily.

"shotgun." Simmons said.

"get in the back." Grif growled.

"FUCK!" Simmons yelled.

"alright, go down there and find out the situation. Find out about this Agent Maine, and do whatever you can to find out more about this mystery." Keyes ordered. The Huey gunships loaded up their occupants and flew down to the planet surface. John's gunship carried the Warthog Sarge, Grif, and Simmons were in. After several hours of flying,

"is that it?" Simmons yelled, pointing to a large Wind Power Station.

"Jun, Romeo, Price, Anatoly, any of you spot anything?" Carter asked.

"I'm seeing several UNSC issued vehicles and equipment. Warthogs, Mongooses, radio towers, crates, more modern UNSC weapons, the whole like." Jun reported.

"anything else, any soldiers perhaps?"  
>"no. Wait, yeah, there's something down there. I'm seeing two soldiers clad in Blue armor, one of them's carrying a sniper rifle, looks to be an SRS-99-S2 AM. They're with a man clad in silver armor with a yellow trim. I think he's the same guy from Blood Gulch, the one you were chatting to, Sarge." Price reported, dialing in the scope on his rifle.<p>

"I knew he was a blue!" Sarge yelled from the passenger seat.

"anything else?" Carter asked impatiently.

"I'm seeing dead bodies. Dead soldiers all over the place. Soldiers wearing both red and blue armor. Plenty of bullet shells and grenade scorch marks around, looks like they got in a big fight. Some of them look like they've been cut with a blade of some sort, I would estimate the rear-blade of a Brute Shot." Romeo said.

"Anatoly, you haven't said anything. What do you spot?"  
>"there's something down!" the Russian sniper yelled out.<p>

"say again?"

"there's another soldier down there! Big one, he's got white armor with a brown trim, wearing an EVA helmet! Got a Brute Shot in his hands!"

"well, looks like we found who killed all the reds and blues. Any word that these Blues are working with him?" Carter asked.

"can't tell, not from this altitude."

"well, we did find them, now let's kill 'em. Drop the Warthog!" Carter ordered. The Warthog fell to the ground, where Sarge immediately put on some weird polka music on the radio.

"Woods, do us the favor." Kat said, pinching her nose-bridge.

"I'm on it." the marine responded. _Wherever I May Roam _by _Metallica_ began blasting out the copter's radios. Down on the ground,

"hey, do you hear something?" Washington asked.

"no? wait, yeah." Church said slowly.

"what is that? Music?" Washington asked. He was referring to Sarge's polka music, although the 141's heavy metal was slowly getting louder.

"what? Oh no." Church said as he realized what was coming. A Warthog roared past them, the polka music emanating from the vehicle's radio.

"yahaha, woohoo!" Grif yelled

"yeah, suck it Blues!" Simmons joined.

"yee-haw! It's Red Army! And nothing's gonna stop us now!" Sarge yelled. Grif drove the Warthog into the windmill, stopping them.

"what a bunch of idiots." John rolled his eyes.

"aw shit wall! Aw, fuck this!" Grif complained.

"Grif, you broke the radio!" Sarge scolded.

"good!" Grif replied.

"who are they?" Washington asked.

"they're the Reds from our canyon." the blue soldier holding the sniper rifle replied.

"double-fuck, windmill blade!" Grif yelled as the windmill blade picked up the Warthog.  
>"look Wash, I don't know how they found us, or why they're here, but we don't have anything to worry about. Seriously, not a thing. These guys are idiots. They can't do anything right."<p>

"um, we might wanna find cover." Wash looked up and saw the Huey's hovering over them.

"smoke 'em!" Carter yelled. A wave of bullets rained down on Washington and the blue soldier as they ran for cover.

"on me, let's hunt 'em down!" John yelled, piloting his chopper.

"Sarge, why can't we blast some good music like those guys?" Grif asked as he steered the Warthog out of the windmill.

"let's rain fire on 'em!" Mason yelled. The Huey's did another pass and fired off a wave of rockets and machine gun fire. Washington and Church hid in a building while the 141 blasted away at their position.

"Grif, Simmons, get behind these crates! Open fire once we see them!" Sarge yelled.

"yes sir!" Simmons yelled. Up in the Huey's,

"get the gunships into position! I want fire superiority on that position!" Carter yelled. The Huey's lined up and let loose with everything they had, rapidly chewing away at the Blue's cover.

"hey, what about that guy?" Veronica asked, pointing to a blue-clad soldier lying on the balcony next to an HMG.

"oh him? Meh, he's fine." Emile said nonchalantly, firing his grenade launcher. A sniper rifle shot rang out, missing the dead or unconscious soldier.

"what was all that about?" Veronica asked.

"maybe he's trying to hit us, but he's a bad shot." Edward said.

"more than likely." Weaver said, firing his rifle. Down on the ground,

"Simmons, keep firing! Don't let up!" Sarge ordered.

"yes sir!" Simmons replied.

"and get the grenades out there!" Grif ordered.

"yes sir!" Simmons replied.

"Grif, stop confusing everyone. I'm calling the shots!" Sarge yelled.

"we're the same rank, I can do whatever I want!"

"you're not qualified to lead in battle!"

"how hard is it? Simmons, you're doing a terrible job! You should try to win harder! I mean try harder. To win."

"Grif, that was bat-shit awful." Sarge said pitifully.

"I learned it by watching you!" Grif cried out desperately.

"excuse me sir-" Simmons began.

"WHAT?" Sarge and Grif yelled.

"never mind." Simmons sighed. The gunfire continued relentlessly.

"Simmons, aim for his bullets! Try to deflect them in midair! Grif, get over here! I need to use your face as a shield!" Sarge yelled.

"keep up the fire, don't stop!" Carter ordered.

"what else have we been doing?" John replied.

"you're not in command in the 141 anymore, Chief, I'm the CO." Carter growled.

"for now." John snarled. The power station behind the windmill suddenly experienced a power fluctuation, momentarily halting the shoot-out.

"Cortana, what was that?" John asked.

"looks like some sort of power surge from within the building. I can get a better read out if we're closer." Cortana said.

"Carter?"  
>"go ahead. We might find something useful anyway." Carter said. The Huey gunship in the middle pulled up and flew away towards the power plant.<p>

"anything now?" John asked.

"there's something in there. Something using a lot of power. Think it might be that large soldier we saw earlier."

"alright. Fire three bullets at anything suspicious." Carter ordered. A small burst of gunfire burped from the chopper.

"hey, who's that?" John asked, pointing to a large soldier on the ground. His armor then changed color from white to red.

"hmm, that's interesting. Let's go back." John ordered. Grif then walked up to the large soldier.

"hey there, soldier! What's your name?" Grif asked. The large soldier simply growled.

"huh, sounds like someone's got a cold. Anyway, listen. I need your help with some….thing." Grif paused as the large soldier lifted up a Warthog with apparent ease.  
>"how can he do that if he isn't a SPARTAN?" Kat asked.<p>

"maybe his armor helps him." Shepherd muttered, tossing his cigar on the ground.

"Doc, you helped build our armor. That look familiar to you?" John asked.

"yeah, it does. Like I've seen that armor before, but I just can't remember where exactly I've seen it." Brown said, reloading his MP5K SMG. The large soldier then threw the Warthog at Grif.

"OH GOD, OH GOD, OH GOD, OH GOD!" Grif whined as the Warthog flew at him.

"okay, bring the gunships to sweep over him, cancel the attack on the Blues." Carter ordered. The gunships flew away towards the ocean, readying their rockets.

"um, sir, why is our backup leaving us?" Simmons asked.

"they're getting ready to perform level this entire area. Probably to take out the Blues in a fantastic explosion that will engulf this whole facility!"

"but if that happened, wouldn't we die as well?" Simmons asked.

"uh, yeah, good point. Aw crap, this is gonna suck. Grif! If I told you once, I've told you a thousand times! Pay attention in battle! You can't let yourself get distracted by-oh crap, flying Jeep." Sarge said, dodging a flying Warthog.

"Run!" Simmons yelled as UNSC-issued equipment began flying towards them. On the gunships,

"alright, turn around. Bomb that area until the big fellas dead. Woods, turn the music back on, let's begin the headbangers ball." Carter ordered. Heavy metal music once again blasted out of the gunships as they relentlessly fired on the massive structure to bring down the large soldier.

"there he is, get him!" Carter yelled. John brought his Huey around to deliver the final blow, but suddenly found time to be going extremely slowly. Even his SPARTAN time was affected. _what the hell's going on?_ he thought. The large soldier changed the color of his armor and walked away. Once he was gone, time seemed to return back to normal.

"all gunships, halt your attack. Gimme a complete sitrep on your equipment. And yourself." Carter ordered. He wasn't gonna get that sitrep, however.

"it's gone! Dammit! You fucking idiots, we almost had it!" Washington yelled.

"almost had it? We never even hurt it!" Simmons yelled.

"he means before we got here! We had it crippled and then you guys showed up and fucked everything up!" Church yelled.

"oh yeah. Like you guys had everything under control before we got here!" Roebuck yelled.

"hey, up yours, whoever you guys are! I don't see you guys doing anything heroic." Church retorted.

"it threw our car at us." Simmons growled.

"I'm fine, by the way. In case anyone's wondering." Grif said.

"no one cares, Grif!" Sarge and the 141 yelled out loud.

"well, all of you are gonna have to help me out, I can't take on the Meta in this state with just Church and…"

"Caboose!" Church and Washington yelled out loud.

"is he that dead guy up on top of the balcony?" Emile asked.

"yeah, that's him! Give us a lift up there!" Washington yelled.

"what, you can't use your own damn legs?" Carter asked with a snicker.

"fine." Washington growled, running up the stairs to the unconscious soldier. As Sarge, Grif, Simmons, Church and Washington ran up the stairs,

"okay, what we do we know so far?" Carter asked.

"practically nothing. I think we'd be better off if we went our own ways from these guys. I don't think staying with them will help us out." Cortana said.

"maybe. But something about them just doesn't seem right. Call it a funny feeling, but I think we'd be better off we helped them out. What are they doing over there?" John asked, pointing to the group of soldiers clustered on the balcony. They saw Washington leave. Simmons and Church had a few words, then Simmons followed Washington. Church then knelt down next to the unconscious soldier, doing nothing else.

"Cortana, do you know what he's doing? The soldier kneeling down?"

"who, Church? This might come as a shock to you guys, but he's an A.I." Cortana said.

"how do you know for certain?" Kat asked.

"because I gave her that ability." Brown said.

"you have something you wanna tell us?" John asked coldly.

"it's a new ability recently developed by ONI; it gives an AI the ability to detect any other AI, whether in a starship, another suit of armor, you name it."

"so how can an AI exist inside a suit of armor without a person inside?" John asked.

"remember Lopez?" Cortana asked.

"who, the Mexican robot? Wait, are you saying Church is actually an AI inside a robot body? And how do you know his name?" Weaver asked.

"I was listening to their comms the entire time." Cortana smirked.

"can you tell what they're saying now?" John asked. Washington and Simmons came back, and there was the ghostly image of a white soldier that looked like Church.

"that ghost, is that the AI your talking about? Is that Church?" Makarov asked over the comm.

"yeah, that's him. Let's get over here, see if they need our help." Cortana suggested. Over on the balcony,

"I have a message from Delta." Church said impatiently.

"Delta? Why didn't you tell me?" Washington asked.

"oh come on, seriously?"

"well, how did you get in contact with him?"  
>"he left a message in Caboose's head. Actually for me to give to you. I guess he figured out I would get in there and find it."<p>

"but how would he know that? Did he know what you are?"

"well I didn't tell him. But he seemed pretty smart. Probably just put two and two together."

"four!" Caboose yelled.

"that wasn't a real question." Church snarled.

"yes it was, I won, A plus." Caboose said quickly.

"what was the message?" Wash asked impatiently.

"memory was the key."

"memory was the key." Wash said quietly as if he was pondering it.

"yeah I know. Didn't make any sense to me either. Just sounded like some kind of stupid riddle or something." Church laughed.

"gather your gear. We're leaving. Now." Washington ordered.

"where are you going?" Carter yelled.

"I know where we need to go now. Do you have any more vehicles we can use?" Washington yelled.

"depends. Where are you going?" Carter smirked. Growling, Washington gave up his answer.

"Delta gave us the key-"  
>"who the bloody hell's Delta?" MacTavish asked.<p>

"wha-no, that doesn't matter! What matters is-"

"either you tell us who Delta is and where your going, or we won't give you any vehicles we can use." Carter said.

"fuck. FUCK, ALRIGHT, I'LL TELL YOU! Delta is an AI, he left a message for us in Caboose's head! We're going to Freelancer Command HQ! There, you happy?" Washington yelled.

"why?" Carter asked.

"alright, we need to find the Alpha A.I., the main A.I. for Project Freelancer! It contains everything we'll need to stop the Meta!" Wash yelled.

"okay, we might be able to help you. So, how are you gonna get there, however?" Carter asked.

"do you have any vehicles we can use?"

"only standard UNSC-issued vehicles, nothing from Project Freelancer."

"I know where we can Freelancer vehicles. Do you have a starship we can use, preferably a fast one? The ship we used is gone and won't be back for a while."

"yeah, we got something you can use. Captain Keyes, request permission to load on the Morning Sun." Carter requested.

"okay, I'm coming down right now." the veteran naval captain said.

"so, where's your ship?" Wash asked.

"it'll be coming down soon." Foley said. The Morning Sun soon burst through the clouds, hovering over the battle-scarred station.

"wow. That's one big fucking space ship." Church chuckled.

"where are you guys from again, what military organization did you say you were from?" Washington asked.

"we never said anything. We're from UNSC HIGHCOM and the Naval Special Forces." Carter said.

"okay, hop onboard. Where are we going?" Keyes asked as the gunships landed.

"Washington, where do you need to get your vehicles?" Dutch sighed, removing his helmet.

"it's a Simulation Base called Valhalla. I'll give you the co-ordinates, but I need to speak to your commanding officer." Washington said.

"that won't be necessary." Captain Keyes said, walking into the hanger deck.

"Captain." Carter saluted.

"are you the commanding officer here?" Washington asked.

"yes, I am. I assume that you're Agent Washington?" Keyes asked.

"I am."

"I'm Captain Jacob Keyes, commanding officer of the UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun."

"captain, we need to go to Valhalla to secure some vehicles from Project Freelancer so we can sneak into the main Freelancer Command Center."

"why don't I just send my squad down there and have them shoot their way in?" Keyes said, lighting his pipe.

"I'm afraid that's not possible. If Freelancer HQ were to come under heavy attack, then the soldiers in the base would simply destroy everything inside. Wipe out the data-base, destroy the buildings, everything. We need those vehicles to get in there." Washington said.

"do you have the co-ordinates to this Valhalla?" Keyes asked.

"here in this data-chip." the agent handed Keyes a single data-chip. Keyes took it, studied it for a moment and then looked back at the Freelancer Agent. He then walked over to an intercom and slid the chip in the data-port.  
>"Ensign Lovell? I'm sending you co-ordinates, get us over there. Now." Keyes ordered.<p>

"okay. What I need from you now is-"

"Agent Washington, I'm gonna explain something to you. And this goes for the rest of our… guests. I can fly you men anywhere you need me to, I'll even lend you the use of some of my equipment. Keep in mind, however, that I am the CO on this ship, and you will obey my orders."

"obey your-"  
>"you are all free to come and leave as you please, I won't stop you. But while you're onboard, you will obey my orders. Otherwise you'll be flying out the airlock. Do I make myself clear, Agent Washington?" Keyes growled.<p>

"understood… sir." Washington said begrudgingly.

April 14th, 2563

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

Unidentified Planet

Valhalla

"captain, I'm reading two UNSC Charon-class frigates in orbit around the planet. Probably working for Project Freelancer." Cortana reported.

"bring the cloak on, we'll sneak past 'em. Once we're near the planet surface, send the 141 down. Along with our guests. Once they acquired the vehicles, we'll pick them up and go to Freelancer HQ."

"roger that, sir. Bringing the cloak online now." Lt. Hall said.

"okay, we're getting rather close to Valhalla. Sarge, you Simmons and Grif take a 'Hog and do what you can to grab another vehicle. And I would prefer them not destroyed. We'll provide whatever air support we can." Carter ordered. The hanger bay doors opened and the Huey's flew out.

"okay, put us down there!" Sarge yelled. The Huey was disconnected and slammed onto the ground, breaking the shocks.

"dammit, Grif! You broke the shocks!" Sarge blamed.

"where should we put you?" Carter yelled.

"down on that bluff!" Washington yelled. Washington, Church, and Caboose jumped off the gunship and slammed onto the ground.

"dammit, that fucking hurt!" Church yelled, rubbing his left knee. On the ground, the situation immediately turned to chaos as all the Freelancer soldiers gave chase.  
>"Simmons, shoot back!" Sarge yelled.<p>

"I can't, the gun's jammed!" he yelled.

"Grif, get us outta here!"

"what the fuck do you think I'm doing?" he yelled.

"who's brilliant idea was it to steal a jeep from these guys anyway?" Sarge yelled as rocket fire rocked his 'hog.

"bring us down there, help 'em out!" Foley yelled. Ramius pushed the joystick forward and send the chopper down.

"force 'em into the wall!" Sarge yelled. The Warthog behind Sarge was shredded by armor-piercing rounds, killing the occupants.

"one down! Get the rest!" Veronica ordered. More Warthogs roared from the base on the far side.

"aw come on! What the fuck!" Grif complained.

"quit your complaining and keep shooting!" Shepherd yelled.

"I got the gun unjammed!" Simmons yelled.

"perfect, start shooting!" Sarge yelled. Mason piloted his gunship and unleashed a barrage of rockets on the far base, destroying several Mongoose's.

"hey, I wanna try something! I think I can make this jump!" Grif yelled.

"20 bucks says you won't!" Carter yelled as his gunship flew overhead.

"yeah, fuck this! Brakes!" Grif slammed on the brake, causing the front of the 'Hog to tip precariously over the river.

"oh man, we're really high." the Freelancer Warthog behind them jumped the gap, getting destroyed by Mickey's rocket launcher.

"yeah, we got 'em!" Mickey yelled.

"you idiots! We needed that jeep!" Washington scolded.

"uh, yeah, and we needed not to die. What's your point?" Grif asked.

"we still need several vehicles. Where are we-" Washington was cut off when five heavily armed Hornet gunships arose.

"next time, don't ask for shit." Grif muttered. The Hornets opened fire. Grif slammed on the gas in an attempt to leave.

"what are we gonna do with that ship?" Simmons yelled.

"you guys have everything under control!" Wash yelled as he ran into Blue Base.

"let's destroy those Hornets." John muttered. The Huey's stopped what they were doing and engaged the UNSC-Freelancer attack vehicles, destroying them instantly.

"Wash, we destroyed the Hornets! So, what's your plan now?" Hudson yelled over the comm. Wash and Church left Blue Base to where the rest of the soldiers met up.

"alright, I need suggestions. The main Freelancer Command Facility is an underground complex of secure bunkers and fortified chambers. Let's put our heads together and see if we can figure out a way to get in there." Wash stated.

"I have an idea." Grif said.

"and let's not do it, is not an acceptable plan." Carter snapped.

"oh. Well, maybe you should've said that before."

"anything else?" Wash asked.

"why don't we call Command and ask them what the proper procedure is for invading their HQ?" Simmons asked.

"next."

"how 'bout we build a large nuclear device and-" Sarge began.

"no. We have to get in there, preferably with the facility intact." Washington interrupted.

"why?" Petrenko asked.

"because we need to unlock the Alpha. The main AI for Project Freelancer. Remember all the AI's you've been dealing with over the years? They were copied off the Alpha." Wash explained.

"you can't copy an AI." Simmons demanded.

"the main one? Fuck that. Those things have caused all our problems. Why would we-" Grif began.

"we're going there, and that's final." Carter silenced Grif.

"technically, Carter, we don't even have to go. We're not with Freelancer, so this doesn't concern us." Kat said.

"what-no, I need you guys, all of you! We can't infiltrate HQ with just three people!" Washington demanded.

"dude, you're not our commanding officer. You can't order us around." Polonsky said.

"I'm a Freelancer!"

"not a real rank, dude." Grif said.

"the other Freelancers we met never gave us orders, they just offered to trade favors." Simmons said.

"fine, we'll bargain. What do you want?" Washington asked angrily. After the reds muttered with each other,

"we want you to demote Grif." Sarge said proudly.

"done." Wash said plainly.

"WHAT?" Grif yelled, horrified he lost his rank.

"another wasted opportunity." Simmons said sadly.

"congratulations. You are now private Grif."

"anything lower?" Sarge asked.

"private. Junior, Grif?" Wash asked timidly.

"I was thinking something with an insulting adjective, or... maybe a demeaning adverb…"

"how about, Minor Junior Private Grif, Negative First class?" Wash asked.

"I like the way you think." Sarge said proudly.

"this still doesn't help us how we're gonna get inside Freelancer HQ." Cortana said, popping up on the holo-tank.

"who-who's she?" Washington asked.

"I'm Cortana, jackass. I'm the 141's AI. You got a problem with that?" she asked as the 141 raised their guns toward the Freelancer.

"um, no, I don't have a problem with that."

"we still need a way inside HQ." John said.

"do you guys have any ideas?" Washington asked the 141.

"usually we just shoot our way in, we're not that great with stealth. And if what you said about HQ was true, then we're screwed." Carter said.

"Mr. Washington! I got an idea!" Caboose yelled.

"I shouldn't ask, should I?" Wash asked.

"I don't know, Caboose? An idea? I think he's bluffing." Church snarked.

"no, it's a really good idea. We drive there."

"yeah, he's bluffing." Church smirked.

"no, listen! We're going to Freelancer City, where Freelancer's from! And this is a Freelancer car! If they think that we are Freelancers, because we are in their car, they will just let us right in!" Caboose yelled loudly.

"but you guys don't look like Freelancers, or recovery agents!" Wash replied.

"they can't see inside a tank. And we got plenty of those down here." Foley said.

"okay then. We'll take the tanks." Wash said.

"Captain Keyes, we got the vehicles. Plenty of 'em. Bring the Pelicans down, we'll bring 'em up." Carter ordered. Several Pelicans came down and carried the Freelancer tanks up to the ship.

"well, looks like we get to see what Freelancer HQ is. Cortana, when we get there, I want you to download everything concerning Project Freelancer, I wanna find out what it is." John suggested.

"I'm with you all the way, John." Cortana whispered.

* * *

><p><strong>Read and review! Next chapter is coming up soon!<strong>


	15. Chapter 14

**I own nothing. Red vs Blue belongs to Rooster Teeth. Halo and Call of Duty belong to their respective owners. Enjoy!**

* * *

><p>Chapter 14<p>

April 15th, 2563

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

Unidentified Planet (Unidentified Planet believe to hold Project Freelancer Command Center)

"Cortana, gimme a sitrep. Is Freelancer HQ down there?" Keyes asked, walking into the bridge.

"just like Agent Washington said. However, we got ourselves a problem."

"what is it?"  
>"there's a helluva lot more activity down there than it should be. They rounding up everything to guard the facility. Tanks, Warthogs, Hornets, everything. I honestly don't think sneaking our way in is gonna work, even with the Freelancer vehicles."<p>

"do you know what the cause is?"

"I would only guess that they heard about our attack on Valhalla. They wanna be prepared for that. There is another way, however, of sneaking in."

"what's that?"  
>"we use the teleporters. We teleport ourselves in there."<br>"anyway of detecting the teleporters?"

"I don't see how they can. There are two Frigates on the far side of the planet, but we can take care of them. But the manner of how they're organizing their ground forces tells me only one thing."

"what's that?"  
>"they're expecting a massive ground and aerial assault on the base. They won't see the this coming. They probably don't even know that we have teleportation abilities."<p>

"alright. We'll teleport the 141 down there. You're going as well; I want you to download as much information on Project Freelancer as you can. I want to know what the hell is going on here. Master Chief, please report to the bridge." Keyes ordered. The teleporter activated and the 7-foot tall super-soldier walked out, slamming a clip into his Desert Eagle.

"what's up?" John asked nonchalantly.

"take Cortana down there, download everything about Freelancer from their databanks. I mean everything. This is a strictly Priority One order, coming directly from me."

"and if anyone interferes?"  
>"lethal force is authorized."<p>

"with pleasure." John cackled, cracking his knuckles. He grabbed Cortana's data-chip and left the bridge, saluting his CO. Down in the hanger bay, the 141 were busy getting their stolen vehicles ready. Every single member was rather heavily armed. They all carried a large amount of grenades, claymores and trip wire, and every single members carried at least one HMG on their backs. The SPARTAN's carried two.

"so all we have to do is let you and Church drive in first, and we follow once the okay is given?" Carter asked.

"yes. That's all you have to do."

"and if they don't let us pass?" Bowman asked.

"we'll cross that bridge when we come to it." Washington said.

"you don't sound so sure."

"I'm just really nervous, that's all."

"change of plans! We're not sneaking into the base with these tanks!" John yelled.

"oh yeah, why not?" Jorge snarled. John showed the holo-image of the Freelancers gathering their forces.

"do you really think we can sneak our way past all that? They got word of our attack on Valhalla, they're gonna be expecting us. We can't sneak our way past that. We can definitely shoot our way past all that, but doing so would compromise the mission." John said.

"so what is your plan on getting in there, SPARTAN?" Thel asked. He decloaked, surprising the Reds, Blue, and Washington.

"whoa!" they cried out.

"what?" John asked.

"um, we didn't know you had an alien onboard." Sarge said.

"why, is that a problem?" John asked, popping in a cigarette.

"uh, it's just that we had some experiences with aliens before, and they weren't exactly friendly. And when I mean friendly, I say so in the loosest sense of the word." Sarge said slowly.

"what, they shot you? That happened to us plenty of times." Jun said.

"no, well, technically, they might have. Let's just say that, one of the blues may have gotten pregnant by an alien. And the blue was male." Simmons said slowly.

"WHAT?" the 141 cried out loud. After a moment of shocked silence,

"okay, I'm gonna forget that happened. Long story short, we're using the teleporters to sneak in there."

"Chief, are you crazy? Granted, the teleporters work more than perfectly. But to try and move the entire Task Force 141 and our guests here into Freelancer HQ, that's damn near impossible." Brown said.

"you and Richtofen built them. Figure it out. That's how we're getting in." John snarled coldly. With no other choice, they brought all the teleporters on line and stuffed as many members of the large platoon inside them, including the one in the cargo bay which was meant for transporting tanks and warthogs. But to try and teleport a tank down on the surface would've attracted too much attention. The only teleporter they didn't use was the disconnected one in Richtofen's and Brown's lab.

"alright, we're ready. Hit it." Carter ordered. All the teleporters went active and sent the Task Force 141 down inside Project Freelancer HQ along with the Reds and Blues. When they got there, they found themselves in one of the main command bunkers amidst the massive base. Sarge, Simmons, Grif, Caboose, and Washington immediately ripped their helmets off and threw up.

"that's only natural for the first time. The nausea will pass very soon." Richtofen said. After the soldiers got done throwing up,

"uh, wow. Never been through anything like that." Washington coughed.

"well, we're here now. So, what's your plan?" Kat asked.

"we got in. but that's only part of the plan, no celebrating yet." Washington sighed.

"man, I was in charge of confetti." Grif moaned.

"we still need to get to the A.I. storage facility. Security's tight since the Freelancers tried to break in there. And it's probably gonna be more tight since the Valhalla incident."

"what, the Freelancers tried to steal the Alpha before?" Church asked.

"yes."

"Freelancers breaking into their own facility. That sounds rather dumb." Woods muttered.

"that's what we're doing right now!" Simmons said.

"so? Just because we do something doesn't make it smart." Grif replied.

"I have the necessary clearance to get close to the storage hall. The plan is, I'll take Church as a prisoner. If I take more than one, they won't believe me."

"alright go ahead. We'll stay here in case everything goes to shit." Carter said, cocking his DMR.

"Agent Washington, I want you to take me instead." Caboose said suddenly.

"what are you talking about?"

"I will be your prisoner. Let Church go. He doesn't have anything to do with this!" Caboose replied.

"Caboose, I'm not actually gonna be his prisoner. I'm just gonna pose as one so we can-"

"have a good life Church. Don't worry, I won't tell them anything. They won't get any information out of me. No matter how nicely they ask." Caboose said. The 141 chuckled at that.

"oh my god, just shut the fuck up." Church groaned.

"sacrificing himself for his CO. what a good soldier. Why can't you two be more like him?" Sarge asked.

"what, brain-dead and full-blown retarded?" Grif asked.

"I would sacrifice Grif for you sir. Just give me the order, I'll do it. Right fucking now, sir." Simmons said, attempting to please his CO.

"why are you taking Church anyway? Why not any single one of us?" Grif asked.

"because if he were to take any member of the 141, we'd just shoot and stab our way in, and the plan would be off." Carter smirked.

"yeah. That, and we're sneaking past seven armed checkpoints. Are you volunteering?" Washington taunted.

"is that a hypothetical question?" Grif asked.

"the rest of you hole up and wait for us. Don't touch anything." Wash ordered.

"how do we know when your finished?" Kiril asked.

"when you see all the guards running toward us."

"all the guards? Whu- yuh- wait, wh-why are we taking Church, again?" Church asked.

"just keep the guards off us." Wash said.

"how are we gonna do that?" Grif asked.

"well, this is the center that came up with all the ridiculous scenarios you guys have suffered through over the years. So have fun. Break some shit." Wash said. He then tied Church up and walked away.

"alright then. I want HMG's on the window panels. Makarov, you and your buddies sneak out there and set up all the claymores and mines we got. Across the field, through the doors, on the rocks, any place you think Freelancer guards might come through to attack us." Carter ordered.

"yes sir." the Russian replied. He, Victor, Anatoly, Lev, and Kiril gathered up all the grenades and explosives and left the facility.

"you getting ready for a big fight?" Sarge asked.

"better safe then sorry is my policy. Chief, hook Cortana up to the computers, see what she can't download from the data-banks. Try and pull everything." Carter ordered. Apparently, Captain Keyes and Commander Carter had the same plan about Freelancer. 12 minutes later, all the explosives were in place and Cortana was done 'copying' all the data from the banks.

"I'm bored outta my gourd." Sarge moaned, tired of doing nothing. The 141 was lying down around the room, taking naps, smoking, drinking, contemplating the meaning of life in a meaningless life, etc.

"so? Bored is good. Bored means we don't have to die. Boredom I can deal with. I have years of patience." Grif said.

"yes! Grif talked again! I'm winning the quietest game again!" Caboose said.

"may I?" Kat asked.

"go ahead." Carter said. Kat gave a rather lethal punch to Caboose's head, knocking him out.

"thank you." Grif said.

"well that's it. I can't sit around anymore, I'm going mad with anticipation!" Sarge declared, loading his shotgun.

"we've only been here 12 minutes." Simmons said.

"really? My mission clock says three days."

"that's because you wouldn't synchronize at the start of the mission, remember? I said we should synchronize, and you said 'why would we synchronize? It's like we're in the future, seeing what the enemy does before they do it. Why would we give up the advantage?' " Simmons complained.

"come on, Simmons, who could possibly remember the annoying conversation we had three whole days ago?"

"12 minutes ago, sir." Simmons groaned.

"Grif, what does your clock say?"

"uh, my clock is the countdown to the next episode of _Battlestar Galactica_. Priorities, dude." the chubby yellow soldier said.

"that show hasn't been on for over a thousand years, you mean to tell me you haven't seen it all yet?" Makarov asked. Another five minutes passed of doing nothing.

"uh, now I'm bored. Simmons, promise me to do me a favor. If the madness sets in, just shoot me." Grif said. Everyone pulled out their guns and pointed it at Grif.

"we can shoot him now if you want. Anything to pass the time." John said, aiming his rifle at Grif's head.

"nah, I think we should save our bullets for something worthwhile. Simmons, get over here! Hustle up!" Sarge yelled. No one noticed a cloaked figure run across the field.

"yes sir?"  
>"you're good with computers, right?" Sarge asked.<p>

"well sir, Well I'd like to think so, I mean there's really all different kinds of skill sets. Like you have your binary computation, you have uh bus transport-"

"yes or no?" Sarge growled.

"yes, sir."

"okay, here's what I'm thinking. If this is Command, and these computers have some of those internets installed on 'em-"

"there's only one Internet, sir-"

"don't interrupt me, Simmons. And as I was saying, they probably have information on everyone, right? Like in a spreadabase or, one of them ROM things? Datasheet?" Sarge asked.

"I'm sorry, was that something I was supposed to understand? Was that even English?" Simmons asked.

"Come on, man, you know, like all the mainframes, on the Reds and the Blues. Series of Tubes and whatnot." Sarge said, not knowing what he was talking about.

"okay, you're using a lot of terms that don't really make sense. I think you're asking me if these computers store all the data on Red and Blue Armies?" Simmons asked.

"control-alt-bingo." Sarge said proudly.

"probably. Why do you ask?" Simmons wondered.

"Simmons, I want you to erase the blues."

"like, the blues from our canyon?"  
>"nope. I mean all the Blues. Gone. Erased. As in wiped off the map. Kablooie. Terminate process." Sarge growled.<p>

"sir, you just blew my mind." Simmons said in awe. Kat chuckled at that.

"is what he said really true?" Carter whispered.

"no fucking way. But I'm not gonna help them, I'm just watch." Kat chuckled. While Simmons and Sarge were busy trying to delete the Blues, and the 141 watching them, John and Cortana were in a separate room. John was keeping his eye on the horizon.

"you do realize that the guards probably won't come until something unexpected happens?" Cortana joked.

"it's not that, Cortana. It's just that… the 141 I fought with, if they were in this situation, they'd more than likely be out on the field, blasting away Freelancer Agents then let them come to us. Sure, we're in a heavily fortified position, but they're just sitting there doing nothing."

"they're probably waiting for you to strike back, seeing as you busted outta Vorkuta."

"probably. Hey, Cortana, the files you stole, can I have a look at 'em? See what Freelancer is?"

"here you go." she replied. All the information she grabbed was put on the SPARTAN's HUD, giving him everything he wanted to know. In the command center,

"Simmons, if that light bothers you, just turn it off." Makarov said with a slight slur in his voice. He was drunk.

"how 'bout someone else do it, I'm working here."

"fine, I'll do it." Price muttered, getting to his feet. Pressing the button, a voice was heard over the comm.

"hello Command! Come in, command! Do you read, Command? Why the fuck isn't anyone answering?" the male voice on the other side yelled.

"what should I say?" Price whispered.

"who the fuck cares, get rid of him!" Simmons whispered back.

"yeah, uh, this is Command. What do you want?" Price asked.

"finally, someone's there! Hey, listen! This is a distress call! We need help down here ASAP! Mayday, and all that shit!"

"yeah, no-one's really here right now, can I take a message?" Price chuckled.

"bullshit, dude! You guys suck!"

"is that the message?"  
>"no, that's not the message! Tell them, we found what we're looking for, and it's under the sand!"<p>

"what the fuck's he talking about?" Simmons whispered.

"I don't know. Okay, uh, yeah, um, I'll take your message and slip it to 'em." Price said, wanting the conversation to be over.

"yeah, slip it to 'em! Bow chicka bow wow!"

"what'd he just say?" Simmons asked. An explosion was heard on the radio.

"aw fuck, I gotta go!" the radio then cut off.

"was that who I think it was?" Simmons asked.

"Simmons, get back to work!" Sarge snapped.

"on it, sir!" he replied. The alarm then sounded off.

"oh great, what the fuck is that?" Grif asked.

"hey guys, we got Freelancer soldiers come at us. I recommend we finish our mission and shoot 'em up." John said, walking into the room.

"Grif, close those shutters!" Sarge yelled.

"belay that, order, soldier! Keep 'em open! Alright, spin 'em up! Let's waste 'em!" Carter yelled, grabbing the controls of an M41 LAAG.

"sir, I got it! All the information on the Reds and Blues!" Simmons said.

"can you erase the blues?" Sarge asked.

"I can sir. But we should think about this. What happens if we delete the Blues?" Simmons asked.

"it means they never existed!" Sarge said proudly.

"But did you ever stop to think, what does it mean to be red if there is no blue? If they never existed what's the purpose of even having a red army if there's no-one for us to fight? Do you understand what I mean? It's like, flip sides of the same-" Sarge pushed the button, deleting the blues. "coin." Simmons sighed.

"what it means is what it always meant. We rule, they suck. Don't overanalyze it, you pussy." Sarge insulted.

"hey guys, where did Caboose go?" Grif asked.

"I thought Kat knocked him out. Wait. You don't think that deleting him from the computer somehow altered the fabric of reality and removed him from-" Simmons began.

"hey guys. I had to go to the bathroom. Church always has me go before a big battle. He hates it when I ask to go in the middle of one." Caboose said, recovering from Kat's punch.

"oh…" Simmons said embarrassed.

"you wanna finish your sentence, Simmons?" Kat chuckled.

"naw, that's okay." Simmons said, his face growing red.

"no, tell us more about the reality bending computer. I'm hanging on your every word." Kat taunted, embarrassing the maroon soldier even more.

"I don't wanna talk about it." he muttered.

"how the fuck do we turn this alarm off? It's driving me crazy! Maybe it's one of those clap things." General Shepherd muttered. Clapping his hands, the alarm went off.

"seriously? A high-security command facility and it comes equipped with that?" Thel asked in disbelief. The Freelancers immediately opened fire on the bunker, causing the 141 to return fire.

"looks like the fun's starting!" Carter laughed. Wash and Church ran in the bunker.

"what's our status?" Wash asked.

"fuck up, 'bout to die, Simmons is a nerd… the usual." Grif said.

"what about you guys?"

"shooting shit up, the usual." Ghost replied, firing a grenade at a Mongoose.

"looks like we got the entire security force out there. We're outnumbered, and they know our position." Sarge said.

"what's the plan?" Church asked.

"we were gonna go down the hallway until you guys brought more guards through there. So the plan is to go down swinging. You first." Sarge said to Wash.

"hey Simmons, could you get on the computer and change my affiliation from Red to Freelancer?" Grif asked.

"traitor."

"hey, gotta pick the winning team." Grif said with no concern.

"you remind me of Dr. Steiner." Mason replied.

"who's he?" Grif asked.

"NO ONE!" the 141 screamed, not wanting to let loose their secret.

"what are you idiots doing?" Church asked.

"this computer has all the records from Command." Simmons said.

"it does? Everyone? Perfect. Now I can prove to you that your wrong." Church said confidently.

"wrong about what?" Simmons asked.

"he thinks I'm an AI." Church said.

"we all figured that out a long time ago. Cortana told us that. Dammit, Mickey, get the rockets down there!" Carter ordered.

"yeah, and we kinda deleted the stuff for the Blues." Simmons said sheepishly.

"what stuff for the blues?" Washington asked.

"uh, the everything stuff for the Blues."

"didn't I tell you guys not to touch anything?" Wash said angrily.

"yeah, and you also said to break stuff. Seemed like a fair compromise." Miller laughed.

"well that's just great. Now I can't prove that I'm a ghost, and I also won't get a paycheck either. Just fucking great." Church sighed.

"and your side never existed! Which means Red Team wins! Suck it, you nonexistent Blues!" Sarge yelled.

"no one cares about that!" Jun yelled.

"sour grapes." Sarge muttered.

"no way, he's not a computer." Grif said, still believing Church was a ghost.

"how can we be sure?" Sarge asked, reloading his shotgun.

"let's ask him something only a computer knows. What's nine times eight?" Caboose asked.

"seventy two." the Reds and the 141 replied.

"holy crap, it's spreading." Caboose said.

"look, we can't simply ask him for anything. Because of all the trauma he's been through, he's not gonna access most of his functions. He probably won't realize his full potential." Wash said.

"won't realize his full potential? Grif must be a computer as well." Sarge declared.

"well, it doesn't matter. We don't need him to believe. Until the next time we encounter the Meta." Wash said. A loud bang was heard from the roof.

"what was that?"

"do you really need to ask?" Dutch sighed, aiming his SMG toward the roof.

"the Meta, how'd he get inside?" Church asked.

"we teleported here, it's not that hard. Must've found another way inside." Brown said, firing his gun at a Freelancer guard.

"perfect." Washington said.

"how is this in anyway perfect?" Veronica asked.

"he's been following us since I found Caboose. He won't be able to resist getting his hands on all the AI in this facility."

"what, he has more AI's on him?" Cortana asked.

"plenty. He's been killing off our top agents and stealing their AI's. Church, you still have Epsilon?" Washington asked.

"yeah."

"good. Let's get it to safety. Then we can finish this, once and for all."

"you know, I'm starting not to trust you."

"what do you mean, started to?" Price asked, grinding out his cigar.

"so, do you have any plans of escaping?" Carter asked.

"I do. Follow me." Washington ordered. The 141 abandoned the bunker and followed Agent Washington down to the motor pool.

"what's this, the motor pool?" Grif asked.

"yes. There's enough Jeeps in here for everyone here. The rest of the guards are outside fighting the Meta, but be careful. Everyone grab a vehicle. Caboose, I hate to ask, but can you drive?" Wash asked.

"yes, but only a stick. Not an automatic."

"how can you-"  
>"we're in a hurry, deal with it later!" Shepherd yelled, climbing on a Warthog.<p>

"right. Caboose, grab that car. Church, throw Epsilon in Caboose's Jeep."

"who's Epsilon?" MacTavish asked.

"his old AI, went crazy inside his head. So he had it removed." Church said.

"never heard of an AI going rampant inside it's owner." John whispered to Cortana.

"neither did I." she whispered back.

"take Epsilon and hand him over to the proper authorities. They'll know what to do with him."

"what, you're not coming?" Jorge asked.

"no. Church and I are staying. Project Freelancer had one last resort failsafe: a high power E.M.P. that can wipe out all the A.I. in this facility. Now that the Meta is here we have a chance to take them all out at once and put this entire project out of commission." Wash said, determined to end the mission.

"what's an EMP?" Grif asked.

"electromagnetic pulse, disables anything electrical." Carter said.

"oh, your talking about an Emp." Simmons replied.

"before we get into a big discussion about this, what if the Meta decides to follow us instead?" John asked.

"he won't. he can't pass up all the AI stored in here. Church, put Epsilon in Caboose's jeep and follow me."

"no, I'm going with them." Church said, climbing in Caboose's Warthog.

"what?"  
>"Wash, I don't give a shit about this. I hate you, I hate the Freelancers, I hate everything about you guys. This isn't my fight, this is yours."<p>

"it's your fight more than anyone else's!" Wash protested.

"no, it's not." Church growled.

"Church, you'll never get another shot at fixing all of this. I know you don't believe what I've told you, but you need to ask yourself, what if I'm right? If I am, or if you have any doubts, not finding out will haunt you for the rest of your life. Not just finding out about you but, finding out about everyone close to you as well. It's your choice. What's it going to be?" Wash asked.

"I'm leaving. That's final." Church growled, aiming his rifle at Washington.

"fine. Just stick to the plan, just run. Get Epsilon out of here. Turn it over to the authorities the first chance you get." Wash ordered.

"shouldn't we help him, Commander?" Emile asked.

"this isn't our fight Jun. If Wash wants to face the Meta alone, then that's his choice." Carter replied. John couldn't believe how much the 141 had changed over the past 10 years.

"yeah, but he doesn't want to face him alone. It's just that someone doesn't want to help." Grif said, referring to Church.

"just drive. When the EMP-"

"you mean Emp?" Caboose asked.

"shut up. When the EMP goes off, it will destroy anything electrical. Get Epsilon out of here."

"you got it, Mister Washington." Caboose said happily.

"take care of yourself, guys. I know that's one thing you're good at." Wash said cynically. The garage doors opened. The Warthogs and Mongooses rolled out on the dirt plains past the mutilated Freelancer soldiers and destroyed vehicles.

"let's get outta here! Move!" Carter ordered.

"you think he'll survive?" Kat asked.

"I wouldn't put my money on it. Besides, if everything goes wrong, we can just call the Morning Sun to slam a MAC round on this whole facility. That'll work." Carter said. As the 141 and the Reds continued their escape,

"Cortana, Wash said the Meta had a large amount of AI's here, remember?"  
>"yes. What are you planning?"<br>"I think that facility has more to offer then we originally realized." John said. He let go of his Mongoose, activated his jetpack and flew back towards the bunker.

"what the hell's he doing?" Ghost asked.

"who cares, let's get the hell outta here!" Roach replied, slamming on the gas.

"where are you going?" Cortana asked.

"find the Meta, steal his AI's. I got an idea. The files you showed told me that the Alpha AI was split and fragmented. I was wondering if it were possible to put the Alpha all back together."

"if we had the right equipment, it might be possible. And that's a rather big if." Cortana said. John flew back inside the bunker and down the multiple hallways to where the Meta was. He found Wash lying on the floor with a gunshot wound on his chest. The Meta looked rather confused, as if the AI's in his head were fighting with each other. John slammed the Meta into the wall with all the force he had, knocking the slightly larger solder out. An imprint of the Meta was left on the wall.

"what's going on? Who are you?" a southern voice yelled.

"shut up." John muttered.

"what, what are you doing back here?" Wash asked weakly. John removed his helmet and knocked him out.

"okay, can you tell me how to get all the AI's out of him?" John asked, moving the large soldier on his back.

"looks like he has several data chips in his belt. That's where all his AI's are at." Cortana said. John pulled them out and stuck them in his belt, including the Alpha AI.

"so what are we gonna do with the EMP?" Cortana asked.

"can you leave a dumbed-down copy of yourself to activate the EMP?" John asked.

"of course I can."

"do it." John ordered. He held the data-chip next to the console and put her back in his head. Activating his jetpack, he flew out of the facility at breakneck speeds, all in the attempt to escape the EMP blast.

"the blast's coming on us! Caboose, get Epsilon outta here!" Carter yelled as his Warthog stalled.

"okay, I'm scared!" Caboose yelled. A green blur slammed into Caboose's warthog and sent the vehicle, Caboose, Epsilon, Cortana and John-117 off a large cliff. Caboose screamed as he flew all the way down.

"Caboose, take my hand! And grab Epsilon!" John yelled. He did as he was told; John flew away from the falling jeep and carried Caboose to safety, far away from the EMP's blast.

"Captain, this is the Chief. I got the data from the computers at Freelancer. I need an immediate pickup, right now!" John ordered.

"roger that, I'll send the Pelican's down now. Where's the rest of the 141?"

"on the cliff edge, you'll see them." John sighed.

"wow. You flew really far away." Caboose said in awe.

"yeah, I did." John gave a light chuckle. Pelicans began arriving and took the 141 and the Reds away. Back on the Morning Sun,

"we did it, sir. Freelancers' over with. What are our new orders?" Carter asked.

"strangely enough, these came directly from Admiral Hood himself. He wants us to take the Reds and Blues back to Valhalla. He says that now Freelancer is gone, they can use the bases there to continue their training exercises until further notice. He also said we have orders to provide them with new weapons and equipment."

"okay, we can do that."

"he also said not to leave them. We have orders to establish a base of operations on to the top of Valhalla, we're to observe them. I asked him what for, he just said those are our orders."

"well, if those are our actual orders, then we don't have a choice." Carter sighed.

"is it me, or does anyone else find it strange that Adm. Hood himself is giving us orders to essentially stay out of everyone else's way?" Keyes asked. No one could give him an answer.

* * *

><p><strong>I have a plan for Recreations and Revelations, for those of you who are Red vs. Blue savvy. Just keep reading for find out, next chapter should come up soon!<strong>


	16. Chapter 15

**I own nothing. Enjoy this chapter!**

* * *

><p>Chapter 15<p>

May 1st, 2563

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

Alpha Base, Valhalla

The Task Force 141 had been stationed at Valhalla for over a month, observing the Reds and Blues. The only things that really happened so far was that Lopez the Robot came back and heavily augmented the Red's base, with the construction equipment Dr. Brown had on the Morning Sun. Also, a Private Franklin D. Donut arrived, comatose. They figured he was gay since he wore pink armor. The other thing they noticed was that Caboose was spending a lot of time near the crashed Pelican and being inside Blue Base. But whatever he was doing, it obviously never worked very well because it always ended up with him on fire. Also, the Reds were constantly trying to attack Caboose, but they never really did. So the 141 was basically doing nothing. Well, almost nothing. Everyone except John and Cortana were busy figuring out how they could get rid of the Chief. They had a lot of good plans, but since John was so aloof and constantly looking around, they couldn't surprise him. They couldn't get him at night when he was sleeping because he always slept with his MA5C in his hands, incase they did try something. They also noticed that his armor would sometimes glow a different colors and make strange humming sounds. They ignored that, however, saying to themselves that his armor was malfunctioning. Today, however, would be very different.

"watchtower Alpha, spot anything today? Any different activity? And by that, I mean, what the fuck is Caboose doing down there?" Carter asked.

"um, nothing interesting yet. Wait, looks like Caboose is taking the Epsilon unit and sneaking into Red Base. Didn't Sarge say he built a holo-chamber beneath Red Base?" Jun asked.

"he did, but we don't have any need for it. That's why we never went down there."

"should we hack into their comms? Might pick up something even remotely interesting here."

"alright do it. And this time, try to keep the Reds out. I'm not interested in what they're arguing about." Carter said. Whenever they hacked the comms, it usually resulted in Sarge, Grif, and Simmons bickering about whether to attack Caboose or not. And every time, it resulted in the Reds backing down from their attack.

"okay, hacking into the comms now. Let's see what Caboose has to say." Kat muttered.

"…it's you!" the retarded soldier said.

"hello, Caboose. It seems vague to say that it is good to see you again. Although, technically, that is untrue…" a calm male voice said.

"Delta! I thought you were gone! I thought you were erased at the… eh… electronic thing whose name some people have trouble remembering." Caboose muttered sheepishly.

"actually, this is not Delta. We simply thought that you would be most comfortable speaking to Delta."

"we?" Caboose asked, confused.

"yes. Epsilon strongly remembers all the other AI in fragments. When Alpha went insane, Epsilon carried the burden of those memories. We can appear as anyone, in this case, Delta, whom, from your stories, was a trusted source of information for you. Therefore, we felt it best that we take his likeness for this conversation."

"oh. That makes sense."

"yes. We thought you would say that."

"so, you can appear as anyone?"

"theoretically, yes. Anyone in our memory banks."

"what about a chair?"  
>"if you felt that was fitting, the holographic technology in this room allows us to project ourselves in any manner. It is highly advanced."<p>

"yeah, because standard UNSC training equipment from our ship." MacTavish muttered.

"shut up." John whispered. Down in the Red Base,

"how about a giraffe?"

"look. Let's just say we can look like many different things and just leave it at that. Okay?" Delta said, wanting to skip the conversation.

"okay."

"we regret that we will not be able to appear to you or communicate with you outside this room, so you must listen carefully. … Caboose, did you understand what—"  
>"yes, I'm listening very carefully." Caboose said attentively.<p>

"all right. It can be hard to tell. Caboose, we need you to find a way to help us. Washington said that when Epsilon was recovered, that our memories could be used to punish people who tortured Alpha." Delta explained.

"okay."

"Washington will not trust us in our recent attempts to build a new body you're working on."

"is that what Caboose has been doing? Trying to build a robot in Blue Base?" Emile asked.

"shut up." Carter ordered.

"we had a fire!" Caboose yelled.

"we remember. Your friend from Red Team described a location nearby with a strange energy source."

"oh, that's where Tucker is." Caboose said a little miffed.

"we don't have any memories of him."

"yeah, I never really liked him. So I leave him out of most of the stories." Caboose said in his usual self.

"the Freelancer Project found sources of intense energy, so a scenario team was sent to investigate the area, but they left without doing anything."

"they sound dumb."

"indeed. This place sounds like the location of the energy source. You should go there and investigate. We can explain more when the opportunity arises." Delta said. Up in Alpha Base,

"alright, stop the hack. They said something about an energy source at an undisclosed location. From our previous hacks, Pvt. Donut was stationed at a large desert. From what we just heard, looks like this Private Tucker is stuck there as well. Remember back at Freelancer HQ we got a call where the man on the other side said something was under the sand?" Carter asked.

"I remember that. You think that radio call and what we just heard are connected?" John Price asked, scratching his buzz-cut.

"let's assume that they are. Didn't the UNSC send a frigate out to investigate a strange energy reading, the UNSC Aegis Fate?" Carter asked.

"yeah, they did. It was presumed missing. They never went to look for it."

"hmm. Wonder if the frigate, the radio message, and these co-ordinates are all connected." John mused.

"it's very possible. Let's go check it out." Carter said, grabbing his rifle.

"any reason why?" John asked.

"yeah, find the missing frigate, bring it and her crew home, and find out what the hell's so special about that place."

"and the reds and blues?" Cortana asked.

"meh, we can shoot them and say they died during the mission." Carter said with a grin. John sighed and shook his head. His former squad was getting very lax, they hardly ever took the missions very seriously.

"get the gunships ready, let's go down there and tell them that we're going with them. And tell Captain Keyes about the missing frigate, we're gonna go after it." Carter ordered. Keyes gave the go-ahead and began prepping the super-carrier. The Huey's flew down to Red Base, where all the canyon's occupants were scrambled around a Warthog, a lot of vehicle repair equipment, several large containers, and several more modern UNSC weapons scattered about.

"we heard about your mission, so we're coming with you!" Carter yelled.

"perfect, we could use some soldiers of your caliber! Simmons, get those water cans cleaned up while we're gone! Donut, how much water did you drink?" Sarge bellowed.

"I was stuck in a desert! Don't judge me." the possibly gay soldier replied.

"maybe we should learn from that and bring water of our own." Grif said from the driver's seat.  
>"nonsense. It'll just slow us down." Sarge counter-ordered.<p>

"slow us down more than dehydration? Or death... by dehydration?" Grif asked, confused.

"I don't know, smartass. Let's say we try! I'll kill ya, and then I'll dry ya out! Who wants Grif-Jerky?" Sarge yelled, cocking his shotgun.

"oh, no thanks. I just had a bunch of donuts for breakfast." Caboose said.

"who the fuck eats donuts for breakfast?" Richtofen asked.

"apparently this guy does." Chernov muttered.

"alright, let's get going! Everybody packed?" Sarge asked.

"yup!" Caboose replied.

"where's your stuff?" Grif asked.

"oh, I only bring a washcloth and six toothbrushes." Caboose said innocently.

"I assume that makes sense to you." Jorge said.

"yes, yes it does."

"yeah, I thought so. So I'm just leave the subject." the Hungarian SPARTAN rumbled.

"Grif, why'd you pack so much?" Sarge hollered.

"me? I only did one duffle." the orange soldier replied.

"well, what the Sam Hell are all these suitcases?" Sarge angrily yelled, pointing at a large amount of bags.

"those are mine!" Donut said cheerfully.

"yours, you're not coming with us." Castro said, puffing his cigar.

"well I wasn't gonna let you guys have the fun of packing. That's the best part about traveling. Other than the airport security full-body cavity search-"  
>"time to go!" the 141 yelled, not wanting to hear what Donut was gonna say.<p>

"Lopez, take good care of Simmons and Donut while we're gone." Sarge ordered.

"me?" Lopez asked.

"can we get going now?" Carter yelled a little impatiently.

"you're right, soldier, we gotta get a move on!" Sarge yelled, hopping in the Warthog. The signature Tejano music came on, prompting the 141 to blast _Metallica_ as loud as possible from the speakers. They sure like their heavy metal, don't they? Caboose climbed on the jeep and manned the Gauss Turret.

"hey, don't ruin my new gun. It hasn't passed any real world testing yet!" Sarge yelled.

"it hasn't passed any fake world testing yet, either! It's passed zero tests!" Simmons complained.

"which means the enemy can't possibly know about it. We have the initiative!" Sarge yelled.

"alright, follow me to that island!" Carter yelled. The gunships flew over the lake while Grif drove the warthog straight into the lake.

"did they just drive their Warthog straight into the lake?" John asked.

"don't worry, they won't drown." Brown said.

"how do you know?" Carter asked.

"I know what they're armor is. It's called PROJECT: THOR. It's a new design of body armor for the military to use. Basically, it combines the firepower, strength, and protection of MJOLNIR armor with the mobility and ease of an ODST battle suit. More specifically, the suits you guys are wearing." Brown said, gesturing to Veronica and her team. They still wore the ODST suits John and Brown built so many years ago.

"I was actually designing that armor near the end of the Great War, but due to lack of resources and the constant fighting, I never got the chance to even construct a prototype. Somehow, Project Freelancer got a hold of my design and made it their own, all behind my back." Brown said angrily.

"how good is THOR armor? How can nonSPARTAN's use it?" Emile asked.

"I designed it so you wouldn't have to undergo any augmentations to use it. It comes with titanium alloy plating, a thin diamond coating for extra protection, and what I presume to be a layer of energy shielding, if not more than one. It's waterproof, you can operate it in a vacuum, and can take a lot of punishment. More than the ODST's suit, but less then the MJOLNIR armor. I designed it so that when it takes enough damage, the suit automatically locks down and sends all it's energy to the shields and outer plating to give the user the most protection. The armor also locks up to prevent the user from moving any further; the temperature inside drastically shoots down to cryo-tube temperatures and freezes the user until further help arrives. In essence, THOR armor is a walking cryo-tube. I also augmented the systems so that if anyone with some form of a HUD comes near it, it sends out a scrambler that tells anyone near the suit that the person is dead."

"but wouldn't that just make the user grab the body and throw it in the morgue? Or even burn it to dispose of it?" Dempsey asked.  
>"uh, that all depends on the person. Trying to crack the armor while in lockdown requires the person to have the correct codes. But from what I heard of the stories of the Reds and Blues mishaps at Blood Gulch, it appears that Project Freelancer heavily augmented the armor and removed that function, so anyone can remove the armor. Also, it appears that the armor was augmented to hold an AI, like MJOLNIR armor. And from what we found out about the Meta, it can hold more than one." Brown concluded as Sarge's Warthog drove up on the beach.<p>

"hop on, we'll take you to the Sun and find those co-ordinates!" Carter yelled.

"then why'd you have us drive in the lake?" Grif asked.

"we didn't, you did. Get onboard." Carter ordered.

"can we at least take the Jeep with us, we got a special weapon we can use." Sarge said.

"alright, fine. We'll take the Warthog." Carter muttered. Shepherd's Huey grabbed hold of the Jeep and took it up to the Morning Sun, along with it's passengers. On the ship,

"Captain, do you have the co-ordinates for the UNSC Aegis Fate, or at least a general position?" Carter asked.

"it wasn't exactly easy, but I got the co-ordinates. The UNSC Aegis Fate is stuck in the Prolmar Sector, investigating some strange energy anomalies on a large desert planet. We're calling Alpha X-45A."

"alright, take us there. I have a hunch we might find out more information we can use, maybe why Adm. Hood's ordered us to stay out of everyone's way for the past month." Carter said.

"alright. I'm not expecting anything out of the blue, however." Keyes said.

"none of us are." Carter said.

"makes me kinda sad to see the 141 in this state. I wouldn't be surprised everyone here except me ends up dead on this mission." John snarled.

"is that a threat?" Carter growled.

"if you want it to be a threat, then it is. I'm just sorry that my former squad is like this, not taking missions like this very seriously. If we were like this during the Great War, we all probably would've died during the 1st or 2nd year." John snarled.

"the war with the Covenant is over, long over. Times are changing, Chief. Get used to it." Carter growled. The two warriors stood head to head, glaring each other down. Although Carter was shorter than the Chief.

"hey Jorge, remember our training on Reach? The mountains?"  
>"yeah, what about 'em?" Jorge said.<p>

"I don't know about you, but for me, I could always tell when a storm was gonna come rolling over the peaks. There wouldn't be a cloud in the sky, but something was odd about that planet. You could smell something in the air, at least I could. There's a storm on the horizon, I don't know what it is or when it's coming, but it's coming. I'd get ready if I were you." John walked out of the hanger deck. The implication was very clear: something big is coming that's gonna change our lives. Whether for the good or bad, we need to be ready for it.

"what in the sam hell was all that about?" Sarge asked.

"a thunderstorm is coming. We need to get umbrellas." Caboose replied.

May 2nd, 2563

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

Alpha X-45A

"well, this looks like the planet. The UNSC Aegis Fate is hovering over what appears to be a large dig site. Cortana, anything down there?" Cpt. Keyes asked.

"let me take a look. Okay, I am reading some life signs down there. Humans and Elites, but…"

"but what?"  
>"the life signs are much smaller than even a skeleton crew to operate a UNSC frigate. I am seeing the wreckage of a Phantom and an Albatross."<p>

"a small battle perhaps?"  
>"maybe. I can't get a very accurate reading from up here, the sandstorms and blocking the scanners."<p>

"alright. Go down there and pick up whatever you can. I want this mission finished, and soon." Keyes ordered. The Huey gunships and Sarge's E.M.P Warthog were dropped off a safe distance away from the dig site to not attract any unwanted attention. Grif was gunning it through the thick sand, even going so far as to make a large jump.

"yee-haw!" Sarge then coughed violently when the Warthog landed on the ground.

"dammit Grif, I told you not to make jumps bigger than my yee-haws! It makes me look bad!" Sarge scolded.

"okay, this looks like it." Grif pointed to the site.

"halt, do not go any further!" a voice boomed over an intercom system.

"I think we've been spotted." Caboose said.

"Grif, watch where your driving!" Sarge ordered.

"you are attempting to access a restricted area, and you have entered a mine field." the speaker said.

"a what?" Grif yelled.

"a mine field, you idiot." the speaker yelled.

"your field, this is not your field. You cannot own a field." Caboose argued.

"Caboose, not his field! A minefield!" Grif yelled.

"you know, the Native American cultures used to tell us that the Earth don't belong to us. We belong to it." Sarge said for no reason or help at all.

"guys, he means explosives!" Grif yelled.

"oh." Grif and Sarge said as a mine exploded for emphasis. The 141 laughed, they couldn't believe how stupid the Reds and Blues really were.

"just, give me the microphone. Okay. Do not, under any circumstances, move. You have entered a mine field!" the male voice yelled as Grif, Sarge and Caboose left their Jeep.

"does thinking count as moving? Because if it does, I think I might have moved-oh! I did it again." Caboose said.

"Caboose, shut up!" Grif yelled.

"well I don't want to get exploded!" Caboose replied.

"how do we get outta here?" Sarge yelled.

"stay calm. We will guide you out."

"really, okay then, perfect! Let us wait for you to come here then!" Sarge yelled.

"what… no, fuck that! We're not coming out there! Just hang tight, we're gonna upload some schematics… we'll be right back. Don't. Move." the man said.

"well, this is great. Grif! What were you thinking driving us into a mine field?" Sarge yelled.

"me? You were in the passenger seat. That makes you the navigator!" Grif yelled back.

"what are you blabbering on about?" Sarge asked.

"everyone knows the front seat is for the navigator! You're in charge of directions!"

"no it isn't, the GPS is in charge of directions! The shotgun seat is reserved for the position of respect. And for people who carry shotguns. See? Quid pro quo. Now Grif, here's the plan. You walk in front of us, very, very slowly."

"no."

"and if you hear anything that sounds like a metallic click, or if you feel your legs getting blown off, just say 'found one!' "

"no!" Grif said.

"oh, I think I just moved again!" Caboose yelled.

"both of you, shut the fuck up! I need to think a way outta this mess!" Sarge yelled.

"the mess you navigated our way into?" Grif said sarcastically.

"how about I navigate MY FIST THROUGH YOUR FOREHEAD?" Sarge screamed angrily.

"pfft. Okay then, bring it. Just stroll on across the minefield here and hit me." Grif said, taunting the sergeant.

"maybe I will." Sarge growled.

"hey, we can hear you talking! Don't move!" the announcer yelled. Sarge just growled angrily.

"Sarge, since we may not make it out of this, maybe there's a few things I should tell you. You know. Since you can't reach me." Grif taunted.

"Grif…." Sarge growled, his grip tightening on his shotgun.

"but I want you to understand, Sarge. It's not because I'm lazy. It's because I don't like you. Or respect you. In any way. I have no positive feeling for you." Grif taunted, making Sarge reload his weapon.

"now I imagine it can be pretty hard to be an ineffective leader with no respect-" Grif continued, making Sarge actually open fire on Grif. Because of the short range of his weapon, his pellets did nothing.

"who doesn't understand that his primary weapon has an effective range much shorter than most weapons, but I think since we're gonna die anyway, you deserve to know that." Grif said, taunting the man even further.

"okay, I'm back. You guys ready, we're gonna find a way to get you outta that mess!" the announcer yelled.

"you knew I was just kidding, right?" Grif said very nervously.

"you people in the gunships, can you carry them over here?" the announcer asked.

"what, it's not like they got their own vehicle, why do they have to mooch of ours?" Carter asked. The announcer and Sarge simply growled at that.

"fine. I got another idea. I need the red and blue one to stand in front of the Warthog while the orange gets in the driver seat."

"my armor's yellow, dumbass!" Grif yelled.

"okay, this is how we're gonna do it. We'll guide the two guys out in front out, and you in the jeep, you follow them!"

"okay!" Grif yelled.

"I'm scared." Caboose said nervously.

"alright. Now I want you two in front to take a step forward."

"a step ain't exactly a standard measurement, buddy!" Sarge yelled.

"just a step!"

"how much? Like this? Or this?" Sarge taunted, walking forward and activating a mine.

"just a step!"

"okay, just a step, not a problem!" Sarge yelled, a little scared by his recent brush with death.

"alright. Now take four steps to your right!" the announcer yelled.

"you mean our right?" Sarge asked.

"yes."

"is it our-our right or your-our right?" Caboose asked.

"what? There is no 'my-our' right!" the announcer yelled.

"is left north to you? Or is it… uh, which direction is it on the compass again?" Sarge asked, completely out of randomness.

"just walk to your right!" the announcer snapped angrily. Sarge and Caboose did as they were told, but stepped into more mines.

"you know what, I can't take this anymore, I'm just gonna fuck it and run." Grif muttered, slamming on the gas.

"yeah, exactly, fuck it! Just run!" the announcer yelled. The 141 burst in tears laughing.

"I knew there was a good reason we picked this mission!" Carter laughed as he wiped tears from his face.

"okay, let's get down there before they kill themselves and destroy more equipment." John laughed. When they landed the choppers down at the dig site, they saw Sarge, Grif, and female soldier in brown-and-white THOR armor with a CQB helmet. From what they could tell, Sarge was giving a sermon because he thought Caboose was dead.

"Caboose ain't dead, is he?" Kat asked.

"nope. He's right there." Carter pointed to the falling blue soldier slamming on the ground.

"wow, that was a really big explosion." Caboose said.

"Blue guy's back."

"I was really high."

"well, now you brought him back. And Grif's still here! I hate to criticize, but you could've had him laying on Grif and squash him! That would've been easy! Just a note; you can take it or leave it, like I said, it's not really in my place to criticize. Okay, the end, amen." Sarge said, finishing his fake sermon.

"what the fuck is wrong with you?" the Brown soldier asked.

"who are the hell are you?" Makarov asked.

"who am I? Who are you? I'm supposed to be here. You guys are accessing an area on lockdown."

"lockdown?" Sarge asked.

"this area is off-limits, what are you guys doing here?"

"we're here to investigate that frigate up there. There's nothing inside, so we figured we could take a look down here. Do you mind?" Carter asked. Technically, it wasn't a total lie. A UNSC Warthog missing the chain-gun then rolled up.

"okay, stay here. Don't move, just don't touch anything." the unknown soldier said, walking away.

"why didn't you ask about Tucker?" Carter asked.

"we don't know anything about these guys! What if _they're _the ones causing the trouble for Tucker? Because that's our job!" Sarge yelled. The brown soldier came back with a purple-colored Elite by his side.

"okay, we want all you soldiers-"

"whoa!" Sarge, Grif and Caboose backed off. The 141 didn't.

"huh? Oh, right. Sorry, we've got experience working with aliens, most other people don't have any."

"oh, we got plenty of experience." Sarge said.

"what, you fought aliens during the Great War?" the brown soldier asked.

"we did. They didn't." Carter said plainly.

"and let's just say that some of us got more physically close to an alien then we'd like to know." Grif said slowly, referring to when Tucker got pregnant.

"okay, let's just set the record straight so we don't get into a big shoot out. I'm sure you've heard between the treaty between the Elites and Humans."

"we have." Carter cut in.

"okay then. We're here to investigate a strange energy reading beneath these rocks. Rules are now, if they find one of these things, all investigation teams have to have at least one person and one alien. No exceptions." the Brown soldier said.

"what kind of reading?" Hudson asked.

"I can't tell you that. In fact, I need you to leave this area ASAP. The alien diplomats will get mighty suspicious if they find another human squad showed up. We don't want to cause an intergalactic incident." the Brown soldier said. The 141 simply rolled their eyes.

"oh yeah, we're used to doing that…" Caboose began.

"what my friend here means, is that we're used to following protocol." Sarge quickly cut in as Mickey put his rocket launcher on his shoulder, the barrel aimed at the battered Warthog.

"alright then. You guys just head on your way and we won't have to report this to anybody."

"we can't our Jeep's busted." Grif said. As if to prove his point, Mickey squeezed the trigger and blew up the Warthog.

"damn rocket launcher, it's always misfiring, I can't ever get it working right." Mickey muttered. Carter sighed and rubbed his forehead, wondering if it would be better to simply shoot their way out.

"damn. Okay, we'll help you repair your jeep, and then you and your friends are gone. Couple of rules while you're here. This is a restricted dig site. Everything here is property of the military. Do not go looking for any artifacts. And do not go anywhere without telling me. Got it?" the Brown soldier said.

"yes mom, we got it." Grif said sarcastically.

"we're not looking for any artifacts, we're here to investigate the disappearance of that ship up in the sky, and we have orders to use any means necessary. Do you have a problem with that?" Carter growled, backing the soldier into a wall. Because he was a SPARTAN and could be very intimidating, the soldier quickly got the message.

"you're free to look around the base. Just head down there. On the left, you'll find some wracked jeeps you can scavenge for parts. There's also water down there on the left, too. Keep yourselves hydrated. You want some chow? It's with the water on the left." the soldier said, wondering if the larger soldier would kill 'him.'

"thanks for your co-operation." Carter smirked.

"alright, let's get down there." Carter ordered.

"hey Commander, you thinking what I'm thinking?" John asked.

"yeah, something doesn't feel right with these guys." Carter said. The 141, the Reds and Blue headed down to the main camp where there were several UNSC Warthogs and Mongooses' lying around. Most of the 'Hogs had their turrets removed and their radios were missing.

"okay, turrets are missing, the radios are gone, sounds to me like these people don't want anyone causing them trouble. The question is, what kind of trouble?" Carter asked.

"why don't we ask them?" Richard asked, pointing to the Human and Elite personal on the far side of the base.

"nah, we don't wanna risk getting into a shoot out. We do, then this mission might be for nothing."

"why are we here again?" Dutch asked.

"ask Caboose." Carter pointed behind his shoulder. Caboose was busy talking to the Epsilon unit, however, Sarge caught him.

"hey, what are you doing?"

"um, nothing. I am doing absolutely nothing." Caboose said quickly.

"huh. Yeah, I see. Well, all the radios are gone, so we have no way of contacting anyone. We can't even call Valhalla to contact Simmons, Lopez, and Donut. Something strange is going on here. Caboose, stop messing with the jeep!" Sarge yelled. Caboose dropped the Epsilon unit, making Sarge look twice.

"okay, my vote, just kill everyone here and find out what Caboose wants so badly." John said.

"nothing ever really changes for you, eh Chief?" Dempsey said.

"I'm just saying, these guys are really suspicious! Hey you, what's your fucking name?" John yelled.

"my name is C.T.!" the Brown soldier yelled.

"what kind of a name is CT?" MacTavish muttered.

"I dunno, what kind of a nickname is Soap?" Grif asked. An alarm then sounded off, causing CT to curse angrily. The group of investigators ran up to the large machine, which was an M313 Heavy Recovery Vehicle modified with excavation equipment. Caboose was standing next to the machine innocently, along with CT's men and the Reds. Some of the 141 members were busy sneaking to the Huey's; the rest were taking position to ambush CT and her men. At the digger,

"hey, what's going on up here? Sabotaging the digger, huh? I knew it! Who sent you here? What do they know about us?" CT asked frantically.

"dude, what the hell are you talking about?" Grif asked.

"dammit, Caboose! Why do you always got to be messing with the vehicles?" Sarge yelled.

"huh, oh yeah. I was just trying to find home for Epsilon. No biggie."

"what the hell is that thing?" CT asked. A low rumbling was heard, shaking the ground.

"shit, he's opening the tunnel! Dammit, are you with him?" CT yelled.

"with how?" Grif asked.

"dammit, get down there, kill him if you have to, but don't let that door close again!" CT ordered. 'his' men and the Elites ran toward the temple, while Sarge and Grif ran the opposite direction.

"NOW!" Carter yelled. Gunfire erupted, causing chaos in all directions. The Hueys flew around, trying to bomb CT and her men.  
>"let's get outta here!" Sarge yelled. Grif climbed inside the large Elephant.<p>

"see ya suckers, you just got yoinked! How the fuck do you drive this thing? Why are there only four levers if there are six directions? Where's second gear?" Grif asked as he drove the slow, lumbering vehicle.

"GRIF! IF YOU'RE TRYING TO LEAVE IN THE MIDDLE OF BATTLE, AT LEAST HAVE THE DECENCY TO DRIVE FASTER THAN I CAN RUN!" Sarge and General Shepherd yelled as they trailed behind the war machine.

"is the parking break on? I don't see, you know what, fuck this, this is stupid." Grif muttered, pulling out his rifle and leaving the vehicle. The 141 quickly slaughtered the majority of CT's men. They quickly met up on a small dirt mound where they found a soldier in pale blue armor wielding a Covenant Energy Sword.

"oh my god, Tucker! Is that you?" Caboose yelled.

"yeah of course it's me, now move!" he yelled as grenades and gunfire erupted all around them.

"so, how's it going, where have you been?" Caboose asked casually as if he wasn't in a thick gunfight. The 141 gratefully returned fire, killing more Elites and Humans.

"what is this, some kind of fucking reunion? Move your asses, you idiots! I'll meet you over there! And who are you guys?" Tucker asked the 141.

"we're with the Red Team!" Carter yelled, firing his DMR.

"oh, okay then."

"let's move!" Price yelled, tossing a grenade. Holding a strong defensive position at the gate,

"what, you fuckers crazy, move! Get inside!" Tucker yelled. The gunships landed on the top, their pilots jumping down.

"get inside, now!" John yelled.

"I'll get the door!" Tucker yelled. Once everyone was inside,

"okay, I want claymores and at least one turret at each entry and exit point, if CT and her man know we're in here, they're gonna try and shoot their way in!" Carter ordered.

"her, don't you mean him?"  
>"no, I mean her. As in…" Carter then made the hourglass figure with his hands.<p>

"oh. Bow chicka bow wow." Tucker said quickly, causing Carter to chuckle.

"so why are you here anyway?" Grif asked.

"huh, oh the aliens are kinda looking for some artifact buried here. Some massive weapon built a long time ago." Tucker said.

"this weapon of yours wouldn't happen to be giant ring, would it?" Kat asked

"I dunno, why do you ask?"  
>"we've had some experience with what your describing. And it wasn't very pretty." John said.<p>

"well, these ancient aliens built some giant ring shaped weapons. And they also built some cube shaped weapons. And I guess this is the pyramid version."

"those people sure built a lot of weapons, didn't they?" Grif asked.

"yeah, I guess they did, although the ring weapons would be more than enough in my opinion." John sighed.

"what are you talking about?" Tucker asked.

"those ring weapons destroy all life in the galaxy. Don't need to get more destructive than that." Carter smirked. A large bang was heard, interrupting their conversation.

"what was that?" Veronica asked.

"oh that, they've been trying to blast their way in here ever since I showed up. They're not having much luck though, ARE YOU, YOU MOTHERFUCKERS? This stuff may look like rock, but it's much tougher."

"what's stronger than rock?" Grif asked.

"paper." Caboose said immediate.

"it's more than likely some odd Forerunner material, that's probably what this Temple is made out of." Cortana said.  
>"all that aside, I say we plant some charges and blast this place to kingdom come. I don't need any Sentinels popping out to fry us." Dempsey said.<p>

"guys, I got bad news. I'm all out of vodka." Nikolai muttered.

"drink motor oil, that'll work." Sarge said.

"we don't have any motor oil on us, Sarge." Grif said.

"if only we had Simmons or Lopez with us." Sarge said dejectedly.

"hey, where's Caboose?" Tucker asked.

"I dunno, I don't keep track of him." Grif muttered.

"great, just fucking great. Now he could wander somewhere and activate the weapon buried here." Tucker said. The 141 immediately took off to stop Caboose.

"great, you couldn't keep track of him?" Tucker asked.

"he's on your team, dip shit." Grif replied.

"oh, right. Hey, uh, so if you guys aren't doing anything, you wanna help me go find Caboose?" Tucker asked, embarrassed about his lame comeback.

"let's go." Sarge said, running off.

"so embarrassing for you…" Grif taunted.

"just go find the guy." Tucker didn't want to talk about it.

"so sad…" Grif continued.

"I FUCKED YOUR SISTER!" Tucker snapped. Outside, CT rammed the temple with the Elephant, trying to smash the door inside.

"just open the temple and you can leave! We'll take what we want, no one has to get hurt!" CT yelled over the intercom.

"fuck you, asshole! Man, I shoulda stabbed that megaphone when I was out there." Tucker said.

"okay, you said you were holed up in here, right?" Carter asked.

"I never said that."

"well, I'm assuming you were. Think you know where Caboose might be?" Carter asked, getting a little ticked off.

"Caboose, where are you? Come out so we can kill you!" Sarge called out.

"that's not gonna make him come out." Sgt. Johnson grumbled.

"why not, he's a blue. Living to die is his sole purpose in life." Sarge said.

"hey, you guys hear something?" Tucker asked. They heard voices around the next corner.

"probably CT's men. Get ready." Carter whispered. The 141 took positions behind the entrance.

"smoke grenades and flash bangs, in the room." he whispered. Once they were in,

"waste 'em, now!" he yelled. Gunfire erupted inside the small chamber. When the smoke cleared, they found Caboose with slightly damaged armor and what appeared to be a Forerunner Monitor.

"I'm scared." Caboose said very nervously.

"who the fuck are these guys?" the Monitor said. It was Church. But to the 141, more specifically, John-117, Dempsey, Takeo, Richtofen and Nikolai, it was still a Forerunner monitor. They immediately reloaded their guns and poured everything they had on it, despite that their current weapons could do no damage to the outer shell.

"who brought the floating bowling ball? Where's the thumbhole?" Sarge asked as the gunfire continued. Eventually, the five soldiers stopped when they realized they couldn't kill it. Although they wished they had brought some heavier weapons to deal with the monitor.

"wait, is this guy Church?" Tucker asked.

"well, not exactly. See, um, technically, uh, this thing is, uh, just a memory of Church. Um, his name is Epsilon." Caboose explained.

"wait, what?" was Tucker's reply.

"me, dip shit! And why'd these asshole shoot me, it fucking hurt!" Epsilon-Church yelled.

"Uh, yeah, see, he's a resident memory of the guy that Church was based on, so he's kind of like, remembering himself. Yeah, Simmons can explain, yeah, much better than I can, probably." Caboose said.

"sounds like another reason we should have Simmons here." Grif muttered.

"I thought he was Simmons." E-Church said, looking at Sarge.

"him, no that's Sarge. Saaaarrge." Caboose pronounced.

"I'm confused, not deaf you idiot. Who's the yellow one?"

"I'm not yellow, it's orange!" Grif defended.

"yeah, then how'd you know how I was talking about?"

"how is it that he remembers us, but not who we are?" Tucker wondered

"WHY DOES EVERYONE THINK I'M YELLOW? SERIOUSLY? DIDN'T ANYONE HAVE A BOX OF FUCKING CRAYONS WHEN THEY WERE A FUCKING KID?" Grif screamed.

"oh, it will all come back to him. See, I've been telling him stories, about all of us. Well, most of us." Caboose said, forgetting Tucker.

"is that what you've been trying to do, rebuild your old buddy?" Sarge asked.

"um, which will be the more angry answer?" Caboose asked slowly.

"so the only stuff he knows about us is what you told him? That's scary on a lot of levels, dude." Tucker said.

"why?" Nixon asked.

"um, I don't know. Church, answer this. Who am I?" Tucker asked.

"you're captain Flowers, right?" Church asked.

"right. And who's he?"

"uh, Grif. With two 'f's."

"my name is spelled with one f, jackass!" Grif yelled. The reds and blues then broke out into a loud argument. The 141 disappeared away from the bickering soldiers.

"okay, so what do we do now?" John asked.

"alright, we found what Caboose wanted. We found private Tucker, but now Epsilon is stuck in a Monitor body. And I'm not a big fan of whatever the Forerunners made." Carter wondered.

"so we simply stay here and follow these idiots?" Kat asked.

"well it's better then the alternative. Wonder what CT's doing?" Carter asked. An explosion was heard, shaking the temple.

"what the sam hell was that?" Sarge bellowed.

"CT just busted through the door, we're intercepting her right now!" Carter yelled. The 141 ran to the main entrance and unloaded a world of hurt on her forces.

"fall back!" a Marine yelled.

"hold your ground, dammit!" CT yelled. It was all for naught, the fire was too great. So they quickly retreated away from the main entrance.

"follow them, don't let her escape!" Carter yelled. The 141 split off into two groups and followed the enemy soldiers. CT and her men never fought a unit like the 141, so they were quickly falling. The 141 didn't realize the Elephant carried more troops, so once the 141 was gone, they poured inside the temple, catching the reds and blues by surprise. In the temple,

"Grif, listen. We may not make it out alive." Sarge began.

"what?" Grif asked.

"if you die, I think I'm prepared to live with that. I practiced it a lot. But there's also a chance you might survive and I won't!"

"there'd be a better chance if you would help me out!" Grif snapped, returning fire.

"In case I don't make it, I can't help but think about all the future mistakes you're gonna make that I'm not gonna be there to scream at you about!" Sarge said, oblivious to their situation.

"oh stop, I'm getting all teary eyed." Grif muttered.

"I just want to let you know that at my bunk back at the base, there's a recorder deck. I've prerecorded about 57 hours of rants that should be applicable in a variety of situations. Whenever you're feeling good about yourself, I want you to play one. And always remember! Somebody hates you." Sarge said proudly.

"Sarge, stop ranting about why you hate Grif and keep shooting! We're gonna provide air support!" Carter yelled over the comm. The Huey gunships took to the skies. Over the comm, they heard some gunfire.

"what's going on in there?" John asked.

"the aliens are revolting against us, they took Church!" Grif yelled.

"okay, we're gonna intercept her!" Carter yelled.

"I thought CT was a man!" Sarge yelled.

"she has boobs, you jackass!" Dempsey yelled, firing his BAR. The EMP warthog roared across the desert following CT. Behind them was a Mongoose with two soldiers onboard, one of them wielding a rocket launcher. Caboose fired the cannon, stalling the jeep.

"nice jeep, dumbass!" Carter yelled. The Huey's took off after CT, firing all their weapons. Surprisingly, they weren't able to get a good bead.

"dammit, kill her now!" Carter yelled. CT had her own problems, however, as the Elites were after her now.

"Arby, shred those Elites!" Mason yelled. The aforementioned Elite gripped the controls on the mini-gun and opened fire. Meanwhile, Sarge, Grif, and Caboose got the jeep working again.

"Commander Carter, we got our jeep working and we're on our way to you!" Sarge yelled.

"hurry up! Great job at stalling the jeep!" Carter yelled as Caboose fired the turret.  
>"who's brilliant idea was it to make an EMP jeep anyway?" Sarge yelled.<p>

"that was your idea!" John yelled he flew his gunship over the ruins.

"I lost track of CT, where is she?" Tucker asked.

"you bastard. I shoulda killed you when I first met you." CT growled as she snuck up behind Tucker.

"fine, you got me. Just tell me, who do you work for anyway?" Tucker asked.

"sorry, you'll never know." E-Church then floated up.

"what the hell is that thing?" CT angrily demanded. The laser on the Monitor's face lit up, killing CT instantly.

"I AM NOT A THING! MY NAME IS LEONARD CHURCH! AND YOU WILL FEAR MY LASER FACE!"

"drama king." Jun muttered. Now that CT was dead, the 141 decided to stick around. They still had more questions, and plenty of time to get their answers. If only they knew what was happening back at Valhalla.

* * *

><p><strong>Read and review! Next chapter will be coming!<strong>


	17. Chapter 16

**I don't own anything. Red vs Blue belongs to Rooster Teeth, Call of Duty belongs to Treyarch and Infinity Ward, Halo belongs to Microsoft Studios, 343 Industries, and Bungie. Enjoy!**

* * *

><p>Chapter 16<p>

May 2nd, 2563

Unidentified Dig Site

Planet Alpha X-45A

"I'm just saying, Commander, that if we stay with these idiots any longer, it might end up bad. For us." Jun said.

"and what do you want me to say to Captain Keyes? That we're just abandoning the mission? That we're gonna leave them? They may be total idiots, but we don't leave any soldiers behind." Carter scolded. Down on the ground, Tucker and Grif were discussing the dead soldiers Grif was ordered to bury. Woods then walked up.

"oh, hey Woods." Grif said.

"hey Grif. Where's all the dead bodies?" he asked.

"oh, Sarge wanted me to bury them, but the sand blew up and buried them."

"well, then they're buried. So, should we say some words?" Woods asked.

"words?" Tucker replied.

"of course we should say some words. These men may have been enemy soldiers that burst into flames when they were shot at and suffered a painful, burning, horrifying death that Grif should go through when he dies, but they were soldiers nonetheless." Sarge said, walking up.

"how 'bout Church, he can say something. He's been ranting to the Elites for a long time now. Hey Arbiter, do you know who these Elites are, some religious sect or something?" Shepherd asked as the rest of the 141 walked up.

"yeah, I know who they are. They're the _Servants of the Almighty Forerunners_." Thel said as Church floated around a corner with the Elites trailing behind him. Whatever he was spouting, the Elites were taking in every word.

"they're a group of Elites who worship Forerunner technology like it's a fucking religion. Pretty sad in my opinion." Thel said.

"who in the sam hell worships technology?" Sarge asked.

"are they from the Internet?" Grif interjected.

"yes, this is just very interesting. I understand everything that is being said. Good." Caboose said slowly.

"Caboose, what are you doing, get outta there!" Tucker warned.

"it's not fair! I worshipped Church, way before it was cool to worship him!" Caboose protested.

"I bet you anything he has a shrine to Church in his closet." Miller whispered.

"oh god, I don't need that image in my head." Jorge replied. The monitor then floated up.

"oh hey there guys. How's life among all the non-deities? Pretty lame, I bet! Pretty sure none of you've been worshipped all day long today. Weak!" he boasted.

"you think he might be milking this a little too much?" Mickey asked.

"why don't you tell that to all the big group of deadly aliens here?" Tucker replied.

"we can handle them. But just to humor them, I wanna see what'll happen if I do this. Hey, your circular holiness! How 'bout delivering the eulogy? We're burying most of these guys 'cause of you anyway!" Mickey yelled.

"me? I only lasered one guy."

"and that was totally awesome!" Caboose said.

"will you hurry the fuck up, we're not it the mood to wait around!" John yelled angrily.

"I wonder what makes him fire his laser, maybe if we get him angry again. Let's try." Sarge said, ignoring John's angry yell.

"you're ugly and nobody likes you." Tucker said.

"you're annoying and your team sucks." Grif said.

"you're round and you can't wear pants." Caboose joined in.

"your brother tried to kill me, so we killed off all his relatives." John, Dempsey, Takeo, Nikolai and Richtofen said simultaneously, remembering to when the Sentinels attacked them on the Ark.

"you guys came up with that pretty quickly." Church said slowly.

"meh, comes to be prepared. You angry yet?" John asked.

"no, I'm kinda depressed. Caboose is right, I can't wear pants." Church said sadly.

"just hurry up with the sermon." John sighed.

"okay, I can do that. I did one a couple hours ago the aliens just loved."

"a sermon? All you did was read the setup guide to the Red's inkjet printer." Foley said.

"yeah, and they eat that gadget shit up. You gotta know your audience buddy."

"how is it that Caboose revived him, he doesn't remember us, but he remembers how to be a jackass?" Grif asked.

"some things are hardwired." Tucker said, walking away.

"attention true believers! And…. Other people." Church looked at the Reds, Tucker, and the 141 who were off on the side.

"we are here today to pay our final, and our first, respects, to the dearly departed. But first, I'd like you all to join me in a song, in honor of me. _I am the best!_" Church began to sing.

"SKIP IT!" the 141, the Reds and Tucker yelled out loud.

"FINE! Okay, uh, in the beginning, there was darkness. And uh, and out from the darkness came a voice. And it said…" Church trailed off. He began looking off to the far right, as if he was concentrated on something.

"and it said…." he muttered again.

"what is he, on playback or something?" John snorted, making Cortana laugh.

"he probably needs a reboot. Good thing I brought my boots, kick him right in the keister!" Sarge yelled.

"I'll be right back, Caboose, take over for me." Church said as he floated away. The mentally challenged soldier ran up.

"yes, and out of the darkness came someone! And that someone was me! Yes. And I said, funerals are sad, and we should have a birthday party instead, yes! Yes, let there be cake! Um, hallelujah, gesundheit." Caboose finished, causing the 141 to laugh.

"okay, this is by far, one of the best missions ever. Wonder what they're talking about." Roebuck breathed.

"don't know, don't care. Looks like they're coming back."

"we need your help. We're gonna try and contact Valhalla, but with all the Jeeps' having their radios removed, we can't exactly use that. And you guys say the sandstorm keeps us from contact your ship, is that right?" Sarge asked.

"technically, it's not the storm. Our radio equipment isn't powerful enough to cut through that, but…" Kat began, staring at the Jeeps, and the UNSC Aegis Fate, and then Church.

"I got an idea how we can contact Valhalla." she said with a wicked smile.

"I got a bad feeling about this." Church gulped.

2 hours later….

"alright, let's try this. You ready antenna ball?" Sarge asked.

"just hurry up. This metal rod isn't exactly in a comfortable place." Church complained, currently jammed on the Warthog's antenna.

"yeah, yeah, quite your bitching." Kat muttered, tinkering with the 'Hog's radio.

"so what are we doing again?" Grif asked.

"we're gonna bounce the radio wave off that frigate, then off the Morning Sun, and it'll travel all the way back to Valhalla. The carrier's got more than enough equipment to do that. Okay Sarge, try it." Kat said, turning the radio on.

"come in Valhalla Outpost Number One. Come in! Red Base, do you read me? Come in! Give me some more power, floating eye." Sarge muttered. Over the radio,

"…..uh, Sarge? Yeah, hi." came a nervous-sounding Simmons.

"identify yourself." Sarge ordered.

"it's me, Simmons. Sorry sir."

"how's everything going there, Simmons?"

"here? Uh, fine I guess. Everything's good. How 'bout you guys?"

"mission is complete. We're preparing to head out soon."

"what was that? Sorry, some static here. This radio's a little messed up. Been a bit rainy here."

"I said, we're coming back soon." Sarge replied.

"oh, okay then, that's great. Hey, when do you think you'll be back?"  
>"hard to say, Simmons. We'll let you know." Sarge replied.<p>

"okay Sarge, sounds good."

"over and out." Sarge replied. Kat coughed at that, the proper term was 'out', not 'over and out'. Of course, she was a SPARTAN, she the military was practically her entire life.

"thanks for the help." Grif said.

"yeah, well, whatever. I'm not gonna fly straight for a whole week." Church flew away angrily.

"Simmons sounded good. I guess he's got everything under control." Grif said.

"Donut and Lopez are dead and someone's taken Simmons prisoner." Kat deduced.

"huh, wait. Everything sounded fine to me." Grif said.

"no, she's right. Think about it, how do you answer the radio at our base?" Sarge asked.

"thank you for calling Red Base, this is Private Grif, how may I assist you today." Grif sighed.

"we've drilled that since day one! Simmons answered 'hi!' that was my first clue." Sarge said proudly.

"and your second?" Grif asked.

"he said the radio was in disrepair. Since when does Lopez, a robot, let anything fall into disrepair?" Kat asked.

"never."

"and look at the time." Sarge cut in.

"can't, the clock on my armor is broken."

"military wise, it's 17:30. And you know what happens at your base when it's 17:30." Kat lead on.

"Donut's daily wine and cheese hour!" Grif said.

"did you hear any tinkling glass in the background?" Kat asked.

"no, I didn't." Grif said, realizing that Sarge and Kat could be right.

"he also mentioned that the weather was rainier. And as we all know, Mt. Rainier is the biggest landmass in the state of... Washington." Sarge continued on.

"and who do we know by the name of Washington?" Kat glared.

"you mean Agent Washington?" Grif said.

"and who's the biggest mass we know associate with Agent Washington?" Kat edged on.

"the Meta."

"so the Meta and Washington have teamed up to kill Donut and Lopez, and now they're holding Simmons and Doc prisoner." Sarge said correctly.

"who's Doc?" Kat asked.

"the only medic we know. And you do you know Doc's there?" Grif asked.

"please Grif, it's so obvious. I don't wanna insult your intelligence by explaining every little detail." Sarge insulted Grif.

"alright, get your gear ready. We're gonna go rescue those two. We'll take the frigate to get to Valhalla. I'll explain the plan to the Captain." Kat said, grabbing the chain-gun on the Warthog.

"how good are these seat belts?" Sarge asked.

"pretty good, I guess. Wait, why?" Grif demanded to know.

"Carter, it's Kat. Sarge, Grif and I are gonna go back to Valhalla to bust Simmons out. We think he's being held by Washington and the Meta. Can't risk taking the whole task force, Wash will be expecting that."

"so it'll just be you three then?" Carter asked.

"I can take 'em, easily." Kat said very confidently.

"alright, you come back safely. I don't really care if Sarge and Grif die, but you come back. Understand?"  
>"I'll come back, I promise. Captain, did you hear all that?" Kat asked.<p>

"I did. I'll approve the mission, just one thing. Do you even know how to drive that frigate?" Keyes asked.

"no, but as long as Grif and the autopilot is working, we shouldn't have a problem."

"wait, what, why am I going along?" Grif asked.

"okay, then. Godspeed and good luck." Keyes said. Kat rolled her eyes at that; she didn't need luck, she was a SPARTAN for god's sake. When they got to the LZ, they found several Pelican's waiting for them. Taking one, they flew up to the frigate, headed to the bridge and powered up it's massive engines. Down on the ground,

"what's going on up there, what are those three doing?" John demanded to know.

"just a rescue mission is all. None of your concern, Chief." Carter said coldly. Oddly enough though, instead of flying out of the atmosphere, the frigate performed an in-planetoid slipspace jump. No one had noticed that Church was now missing.

May 3rd, 2563

Planet 'Valhalla'

Valhalla

UNSC Aegis Fate

"okay, does everyone remember the plan?" Kat asked.

"yeah, I go out there, blast Wash and the Meta with my shotgun and save Simmons. And hopefully, Grif will get caught in the blast and die a horrible, painful death. Is that right?" Sarge asked.

"no. You're going out there, you're gonna give your guns to Wash, and then give us the password to bust in."

"roger that. And the password is shotgun."

"you say that word every 5 minutes." Grif replied.

"exactly, it's so that you know what the code-word is. Time to skedaddle. Uh, how am I getting up there?" Sarge looked up at the large wall. Kat sighed. Grabbing the smaller soldier, she flew him up to the top of the wall and carelessly dropped him.

"wow, I wish I could've done that a long time ago. Or basically any time when I feel like shooting him." Grif said.

"shut up and get ready." Kat snarled. She jumped on the back and pulled the bolt back on the gun. On the other side of the wall, they heard some arguing and then heard Sarge bellow out the word 'shotgun' over and over.

"SHOTGUN, GODAMMIT! SHOTGUN!" he finally screamed.

"GRIF!" Kat yelled.

"oh yeah, that's my cue." he muttered. Slamming on the gas, he smashed through the wall, plowing Washington onto the ground.

"how's my bumper taste, asshole?" Grif yelled. An angry hand shot up, grabbing on the hood. Wash climbed on, only to be booted off by the female SPARTAN, sending him into a large pile of UNSC-issued Fusion Coils, all while she wrenched the shotgun from his grasp.

"here ya go." she tossed the weapon to it's former, who jumped into the passenger seat.

"hey, can we use a code-word that's not something you say every 5 minutes?" Grif asked angrily.

"just drive, numbnuts." Sarge ordered. As they neared the coils,

"Agent Washington…" Sarge began.

"what?" Wash asked, disorientated from his crash.

"you just got-" Sarge pulled the trigger too early, blowing up the coils.

"aw dammit, I messed up my one liner!" Sarge complained.

"no one cares! Grif, get over to the Red Base, now!" Kat yelled.

"work, work, work." the orange Simulation Trooper complained.

"and step on it, dirt bag!" Sarge complied. While Grif, Sarge, and Kat shot up Valhalla, Epsilon-Church floated into the base. Over at Red Base,

"Simmons, get over here!" Kat yelled, firing the chain-gun and peppering the base with .50 cal armor piercing/incendiary rounds. Stuck between two equally bad options, Simmons decided to leave Doc for the Meta and flee. Jumping off the base, screaming while he was flying, he found the chain-gun to be occupied. The closest thing he grabbed onto the was the rear bumper. Because all the explosions from the Meta's Brute Shot was rocking the Warthog, Simmons had an extremely uncomfortable ride.

"Simmons, stop screwing around and get on!" Sarge yelled.

"this isn't on purpose!" Simmons yelled. As the Warthog continued to be trashed about,

"Grif, get us outta here!" Kat yelled.

"on it!" Grif yelled, flooring it.

"wait, just slow down, I can-" Simmons began gurgling as the 'Hog drove through the river.

"what'd he just say?" Sarge asked, reloading his shotgun. The Meta jumped up, firing his weapon.

"Grif, lose him!" Sarge yelled.

"don't worry, we'll just do what we did last time!" Grif yelled as the Meta slammed onto the engine of the Warthog, sending everyone except Kat and Simmons flying. Kat held onto the chain gun and continued firing at the Meta, while Simmons was stuck holding onto the bumper. The Warthog landed on the side. The Meta took that opportunity to blast away at the machine, sending it flying.

"I'm too pissed to hold on, but I'm too scared to let go!" Simmons whimpered. Once it landed,

"that was the worst driving of all time!" Sarge yelled, picking up his shotgun.

"because that wasn't driving! That was crashing and burning!" Grif retorted.

"hmm. Touché." Sarge muttered. Simmons wandered about, all dizzy.

"wuhu, wuh huh weeaha, wha- what happened, where am I?" he asked, picking up the destroyed bumper, holding it like a baseball bat. The Meta reloaded his weapon and walked towards them.

"okay ladies and gents, and Grif, get ready! He can't kill us all!" Sarge yelled, aiming his shotgun.

"why can't he?" Kat asked, cocking the dismounted chain-gun.

"hmm. Good point." Sarge replied. Church then came by.

"oh hey guys. Man, your jeep got fucked up! Who's the big dude? Sup, gigantor!" Church insulted the Meta. In response, the larger soldier took a swing at him.

"whoa, you kiss your mother with that mouth?"

"what are you doing here?" Kat asked angrily.

"who cares, just lead him outta here!" Sarge yelled.

"where?" Church asked.

"anywhere that's not here!" Grif yelled. Church led the Meta away. Kat, Sarge, Grif, and Simmons ran through the hole to the other side.

"quick, everyone through the hole! Wow, just saying that makes me miss Donut." Sarge muttered.

"why would you miss the gay soldier?" Kat asked.

"touché again." Sarge replied. Inside,

"okay, how do we seal the hole?" Sarge asked.

"do we have any grenades?" Grif asked.

"grenades aren't gonna seal this. Hey, dipshit!" Kat yelled, another idea in her head.

"you talking to me?" Church asked, floating through the hole.

"yeah, you! This is all your fault, you piece of shit! You got us in this mess!" Kat yelled.

"me, it was your friend we had to rescue." Church defended.

"that's bullshit, dude. And because of you, now the Meta's gonna come and kill us all!" Grif joined in, knowing what Kat was trying to do.

"what are you two doing?" Sarge asked

"okay, I wasn't even looking for you guys. I was looking for-"

"oh, I get it. Can it, you oversized Christmas tree ornament!" Sarge yelled.

"oh, you wanna start?" Church asked.

"you're mother takes it up the exhaust port!" Kat yelled.

"come on, Simmons, help us out." Sarge urged.

"I don't know what you're doing." the Maroon soldier stammered.

"you're mother gets paddled like a pinball!" Kat continued.

"hey, let's leave mothers outta this!" Church growled.

"we need insults to increase his stress levels!" Sarge explained.

"oh okay. Um, Grif you're so fat you broke your arm and gravy came out. Sarge, I find a lot of your tactical plans to be questionable if not downright mediocre. Kat-"

"not at us, you idiot. At him!" Kat snarled.

"I just barely got here, I don't know the rules of your stupid game!" Simmons whined.

"you guys are a bunch of idiots." Church ignored everyone.

"okay, this isn't working. We need to find something that'll make him very pissed off." Kat wondered.

"has he seen the last episode of _The Sopranos_ yet?" Grif asked.

"uh-oh, it's the big guy! And there's…. Washington!" Church yelled angrily, firing his laser and sealing the hole. He seemed to regret it, however.

"no, open it up! I have to go back!" he yelled.

"go back, are you crazy? We're not going back there after what we just been through!" Kat exclaimed.

"no, he'll find her! Don't you understand? I can't let them, get… to…. Her… first." Church sighed, then fell outta the air.

"okay, did he just go crazy and fall asleep on us?" Kat asked.

"maybe he ran outta juice. He's had a hard day, let him sleep it off. Okay, load him up and let's hit the road." Sarge ordered.

"so what is this thing, some sort of pet?" Simmons asked.

"in a manner of speaking, yes." Kat said, picking up the monitor and harshly chucking it inside the Pelican.

"no need to be cruel to the light bulb." Sarge said.

"would you rather I chuck you in the Pelican, I can do that as well." after a moment of silence,

"okay, you can throw the light bulb around." Sarge said. The Pelican roared up to the frigate and they headed back to the dig site.

"wonder if the aliens are dead yet, maybe they killed Caboose because their floating bowling ball was gone." Grif said.

"I really doubt that." Kat rolled her eyes.

May 3rd, 2563

Unidentified Dig Site

Planet Alpha X-45A

When they got back, they found several aliens dead, no doubt the 141 killed them.

"wow, what happened here?" Grif asked.

"meh, the aliens got rowdy so your friends killed a bunch of 'em. It was pretty badass, the aliens never stood a chance against them." Tucker said.

"wow, I was here to witness this glorious event. And Grif shoulda been here as well, he coulda died in the battle." Sarge said.

"good times, good times." Simmons said.

"alright, we got you out. Now let's see what the hell is so special here at this desert." Kat muttered, removing her helmet. That's when they heard some explosions and gunfire.

"hmm, what's all that?" Sarge asked.

"looks like not all the Elites are dead." Kat snarled, putting her helmet back on.

"damn, she can run fast. I wonder how she is in bed, bow chicka bow wow." Tucker said, admiring Kat's speed and her ass.

"let's check it out, see if we can help." Sarge ordered.

"I'm gonna wish we never went on this mission." Grif sighed. Over on the far side of the ruins, the 141 and a large amount of Elites were currently duking it out. And the 141 was winning.

"glad you guys joined up, we could use your help. And what's he doing here?" Carter asked, referring to Church's unconscious (deactivated) form.

"oh him, he just fell asleep on us." Grif said, dropping him. A plasma grenade landed on Church. When it blew, it sent him ricocheting around ruins, before it finally landed back at the 141.

"huh, what-what's going on?" Church slowly asked. The Elites took notice of his awakening form.

"get him outta here, dammit!" Carter yelled.

"what do we do?" Simmons asked.

"I don't know. This!" Grif yelled, punting Church away like he was a football.

"FUCKERRRRRRRRRR!" Church screamed as he flew through the sky.

"great, now let's finish these wankers!" Price yelled, sending fiery lead downrange with his rifle. The Elites, however, seeing their 'god' fly away, decided not to fight anymore.

"okay, they ain't shooting. Let 'em go." Carter said.

"let 'em go, are you kidding me?" John asked.

"this isn't the Covenant, chief, just a separate group of Elites. If they're not fighting, why waste ammunition?" Carter reasoned.

"whatever you say, commander." John gritted between his teeth.

"is Grif dead?" Sarge asked.

"no, he's here." Makarov muttered.

"dammit." Sarge swore.

"let's go get Epsilon." Caboose said. They found out where Grif kicked him: straight in the minefield.

"oh, it's over there." Grif said slowly.

"so, what's so bad about it being over there?" Simmons asked.

"uh, nothing. It's just a really long way over there." Caboose said.

"he's, like, 2 feet away, anyone can grab him!" Simmons cried.

"so why don't you do it?" Dutch challenged.

"fine, I will. I don't have time for this anyway." Simmons muttered. He ran into the minefield, setting a mine off and sending him back.

"you guys knew about that, didn't you?" Simmons growled.

"yeah, we did." Carter smirked. The blue eye on the Monitor then began glowing green, a sign that Church was coming back to life. Oddly enough, John's armor began humming and flashing different colors.

"heh heh, looks like all the kicking and blowing up brought the little guy back to life. That's adorable." Sarge said.

"so why is his blue parts green?" Roebuck asked.

"I don't know." Caboose resigned.

"Caboose, is that you?" Delta asked.

"Delta?" Caboose asked.

"Caboose, I need you to listen, my time is brief. Epsilon is not in control right now. But he will be again, shortly." Delta explained.

"that's great!" Caboose said happily.

"perhaps not. The encounter with Agent Washington has jarred loose many of his memories. Epsilon has not, historically, coped with these memories very well."

"what does that mean?" Carter asked.

"we fear he may pursue certain memories in particular."

"who's we?" John asked.

"myself and the other memories of the Alpha fragments. Epsilon may not yet be aware of our presence, but eventually he will be. We cannot hide forever. It is likely at this point he will begin the cycle again. That must not happen." Delta explained further.

"why is that bad?" Cortana asked.

"to adequately explain would take too long. He has begun to search his memories now, he is clearly looking for something."

"well, you did always say that memory was the key." Caboose said.

"correct, memory is the key, Caboose. But not everything that is locked is meant to be unlocked. He is coming back now, I must go before he discovers me."

"but if he meets you in there then you can be friends. But not best friends. But, you know 'cause that job's, taken? But, you know, maybe acquaintances?" Caboose asked hopefully.

"if only I, were the memory he was searching for." Delta said pitifully. The green faded away to be replaced by light blue.

"Cortana, do you understand what was going on?" John asked.

"looks like Epsilon is searching for a memory within his matrixes. A very specific memory, something that he desperately wants to find. Memory fragments of the different AI's are trying to stop him, probably they don't want him to go through the rampancy cycle again."

"any idea why all these AI's on my belt are acting up now, the 141's getting suspicious." John whispered. Church and Caboose walked and floated away, talking about something.

"hey Tucker, go distract the aliens for us, will ya?" Carter asked.

"me, why me? You guys are the badass space marines, why can't you do it?" he asked. Jorge ended up punting the smaller soldier across the ruins towards the Elites.

"MOTHERFUCKERS!" Tucker screamed as he flew through the air.

"so, what do we do?" Jorge asked.

"well, there's nothing of importance here at the dig site, at least nothing concerning us. I think we should pack everything up and leave, our mission is over." Carter said.

"so what about those two, looks like they're leaving in a awful hurry." Emile pointed to Epsilon and Caboose.

"you know the Blues are always going on fun missions, Red Team sucks." Grif muttered. Sarge beat him over the head with his shotgun.

"don't ever say that about your own team, Red Team is the best team in the whole darn galaxy!" Sarge scolded.

"looks like they're talking about some facility, might be worth checking out." Kat said.

"facility, eh? I knew the Blues were up to something. Come on men, let's get after those Blues! Sounds like this is the big opportunity we've been waiting for." Sarge declared.

"someplace to hole up until this all blows over?" Grif asked hopefully.

"someplace that isn't a desert?" Simmons asked, not wanting to stay in the desert anymore.

"no! A place to finally restore the Blues to Command's database. Get yer typing fingers ready Simmons!" Sarge ordered.

"fine, I'll go get my carpel tunnel braces." Simmons sighed.

"if we're gonna follow the blues, we're gonna need a vehicle."

"there's plenty of Warthogs down there." Eddie Buck pointed down at the camp.

"why, looks like Caboose and Church walked there, I think we can keep up on foot." Simmons said.

"on foot?" Grif asked, horrified at the prospect of walking long distances.

"uh, Simmons? We're the Reds. We don't walk anywhere. We travel as the good Lord intended: in the largest possible vehicle with the maximum horsepower allowed by local law enforcement. And if there's no cars available, we find the biggest, nastiest, meanest, land animal we possibly can, beat the crap out of it, and saddle that puppy up." Sarge reminded his soldier.

"shame on you, Simmons. Shame on you." Grif joined in the scolding.

"I'm sorry." he muttered sheepishly.

"let's just forget it ever happened." Sarge said, wanting to forget the incident.

"I think it should go on his permanent record." Grif suggested.

"just get the jeep, you asshole!" Simmons snapped. As the Reds went down to procure their Jeep,

"think we should follow 'em?" John asked.

"why?" Carter wanted to know.

"think about it, we hardly know anything about Project Freelancer. The records we did take from HQ, all they were really about was where these different bases were, but they told us nothing about what these bases are for or what they're doing scattered across different planets in the first place. If we follow the Reds and Blues, we might find plenty of answers, answers we need to know about the Freelancers." John explained.

"alright. Let's call up Captain Keyes and try and find out what planet the Reds and Blues are going to."

"I don't think they're going to a planet. If Church knew the facility was on a different planet, they would've asked us to take us there. Given that they're simply walking there, I have a feeling this facility is very close by." Kat reasoned.

"alright. Get the Huey's, we'll fly there." Carter ordered.

"what about the Elites?" Foley asked. They were currently harassing Tucker.

"looks like Tucker's got it under control." Thel said.

"alright, let's go." the gunships took to the skies, quickly finding the Red's Warthog.

"do you know where you're going?" Carter yelled.

"nope. I tasked Grif here with finding the Blues, we'll just follow them!" Sarge yelled.

"right, I'm sure." Carter snorted. After about 3 hours of traveling, they left the desert and found themselves in a very lush, forested ecosystem, complete with waterfalls, lakes, all that shit. Grif ended up parking the Warthog on top of a waterfall.

"Grif, you idiot! You got us lost again! Finding the blues is your responsibility!" Sarge yelled.

"I thought my responsibility was to bring extra ammo!"

"well now, it's to find the Blues so we can put 'em back in the database and then kill them! Everyone knows that!"

"right, I'm sure they do." Simmons muttered.

"Captain Keyes, do you know where Caboose and Epsilon went?" Carter asked.

"I'm on the far side of the planet right now, Commander. It'll take a while for me to get over to your position. Just hold on."

"right, we'll hold here."

"did Captain Keyes just tell us to go fuck ourselves?" Dunn asked.

"pretty much, corporal." Shepherd replied.

"alright, Grif, get us down from here. And by that I mean DON'T DRIVE US OFF THE WATERFALL!" Sarge screamed as the Warthog fell into the water below.

"what a bunch of idiots." Carter sighed, scratching his scalp. The three Red Team soldiers came up, with Simmons and Sarge yelling at Grif for essentially trying to drown them.

"Doc, can they swim in that armor?" Kat asked.

"those three? I wouldn't bet on it." Brown said. Surprisingly, the three managed to swim ashore, pulling out their weapons.

"you find anything yet?" Carter asked.

"nothing yet, Commander. I'll keep you posted. Grif, go first and find the Blues!" Sarge ordered.

"fine." Grif sighed. Walking through the concrete ruins and overgrown jungle, they quickly found what they were looking for.

"looks like we found what we're looking for, Commander."

"yeah, we saw it. Church and Caboose talked to that tree and the wall opened up. Okay, let's blast the wall open."

"couldn't we simply talk to the tree to open the wall for us?" Simmons asked. Everyone stared at him.

"fine, blow it open." Simmons sighed.

"Makarov." Carter ordered. The Russian soldier jumped down and slapped on a rather large satchel purely made out of C-12, five bricks of it. Priming the detonator, he jumped back on the chopper and motioned for John to fly away.

"why?"

The explosives detonated, blasting an insanely massive hole in the wall, revealing a metal hallway. The tree Caboose previously talked to was blown away.

"that's why."

"okay, let's get in there. Keep your eyes open. Everyone's hostile, well, except Caboose." Carter ordered.

"does Grif count as everyone?" Sarge asked.

"no, he doesn't. You three, you go search this facility."

"what about you guys?" Grif asked.

"find out more about Freelancer, see about the data-bases housed in here."

"okay then, have it your way." Sarge grumbled. In the main command post for the makeshift facility,

"well, anything?" Carter asked.

"whoever's in charge here sure doesn't want anyone to access their logs, but I think I almost-" Kat said, but she stopped when everyone heard the sound of a large steel door being bust down.

"what was that?" Hudson asked. An alarm began blaring as the AI in charge began repeating a phrase.

"alarm, security breech, level Alpha. All personnel report for duty. This is not a drill." the female AI said.

"crap, run!" Simmons screamed as he ran out of the hallway.

"where is she?" Grif asked.

"I don't wanna die!" Simmons yelled as Sarge was firing his shotgun behind him. A black figure raced by, not fazed by the pellets.

"Sheila, we have to help them." Caboose said, walking into the room.

"help who?" Sheila asked.

"the Reds! Tex is attacking them, we have to stop her."

"stop Agent Texas? Oh no, absolutely not. We should never interfere with an ongoing battlefield simulation test. Our job is to observe and document."

"sounds like a good job to me, let's watch the Reds get their asses handed to them." Carter said with a smirk.

"but they'll die!" Caboose whined.

"oh, that would be wonderful! What a successful test." Shelia complimented.

"okay, if you guys aren't gonna help them, I will." John said, leaving the room. In the levels below,

"we need to keep moving, men. Come on, double time. Hell, I'd settle for single time." Sarge ordered.

"maybe we should just fight back. I'm afraid she's gonna pick us off one by-" a black-colored gauntlet smashed through the steel wall and grabbed Simmons by the neck.

"ONE!" he yelled, scared and surprised. Tex kicked the steel plating, sending it flying into Red team soldiers.

"hey, pick on someone your own size." John growled. That was a bit of an understatement, the SPARTAN-II was larger and taller then Agent Texas. Tex charged the new threat. Using his SPARTAN time, John was able to see when and where Tex would strike him. Grabbing her left arm, he twisted it around and flung her off to the side, slamming her on a metal crate. She slowly got up and found herself peppered with armor-piercing rounds. However, the shielding held, albeit weakened to the point of non-existent. John dropped the weapon and grabbed his Desert Eagle. Tex to the opportunity to remove him from the fight. She tackled him to the ground, knocking the gun away from him. She then grabbed him and flung him through a large metal plate, pinning Grif underneath him.

"get off me!" Grif moaned.

"get outta my way!" John snarled, tossing the smaller soldier aside like he was a rag doll.

"Grif, if you're gonna pick a fight with a SPARTAN, at least do so with dignity and honor!" Sarge yelled as he got a face-full of Tex.

"Caboose, help us!" Simmons yelled.

"how? The computer won't help me! She's mean! this place is filled with mean ladies!" Caboose replied.

"push some buttons, I don't know!" the frantic Maroon soldier yelled.

"buttons, oh man, I love buttons!" Caboose yelled, pressing the controls on the console. Several rocket launchers fell down at Simmons' feet.

"wow, that worked perfectly. Thanks, Caboose!" Simmons yelled.

"great! How did I do that?" Caboose asked as Simmons ran away. Back at the main fight,

"Grif, stop complaining about your balls and help us out!" Sarge yelled, firing his shotgun at Tex. John noticed Simmons slowly climb on top of a large crate. Tucker then popped in, chucking a plasma grenade at Tex, which she avoided.

"hey sweet cheeks! Remember me? Step away from the idiots!" he yelled. John took this moment to quickly tackle her. It worked, but Tucker started to attack and ended up attacking John instead. John simply grabbed Tucker and flung him away. Right into Simmons.

"oh shit!" Simmons yelled as Tucker collided with him, sending him off the container. It was now Sarge, Grif, Tex and John-117. John and Tex were in a fist-fight, but somehow, Grif ended up in the tangle as well. He was pinned down on the ground with Sarge's shotgun pointed at his face.

"private Grif, you should be ashamed of yourself! We've run outta ammo again, that's your responsibility!" Sarge scolded.

"I guess this is the first time my laziness has saved my-life! PROTECT ME, CONE!" Grif screamed as Tex slammed the gun into his privates, sending him flying into Simmons.

"you idiots, let me show you how it's done!" Sarge yelled as Tex punched him, sending him flying.

"nice demonstration, Sarge." Grif muttered.

"just shut up." he muttered. John decided enough was enough and charged at the black soldier, tackling her to the ground.

"hey guys, look up there." Simmons whispered.

"hey Caboose, remember when I said not to help me? Forget that, I need you to help me!" Tucker yelled. The large crate fell down, oddly enough, right on John-117. Enraged, he kicked it away. At the Reds and Blues. Because of the superhuman speed it flew toward them, Tucker barely managed to cut it in half with his sword while the others got crushed.

"oh fuckberries. Tex, can you-" Tucker got body slammed by Tex when John tossed her aside.

"that's it, come here!" Tucker growled. At the wreckage,

"boy, I thought we were goners. Sarge, where are you?" Simmons yelled.

"here. I feel defeated, yet inexplicably rejunivated!" the staff sergeant yelled, popping out from beneath several med kits. Tucker charged into the fight, but only ended up getting the shit beat outta him between Tex and John. John tossed him away into a teleporter, wanting no more interruptions. He fell out of another teleporter, right into the arms of John and Tex.

"get outta here!" John snarled, pulling out his knife and slamming it into Tucker's crotch. With all his force, he tossed Tucker away back to the Reds. John turned around and slammed a lethal punch into Tex's chest, denting her armor. In response, Tex ducked beneath John and kicked his legs, momentarily weakening his stance. Tex took advantage of that and tackled him to the ground. However, John was expecting this and grabbed Tex, slamming her into the ground over and over. When she had enough, John let go of her and walked away.

"behind you, Chief!" Cortana yelled. John looked behind and saw something black fly towards him. Whatever it was, it collided with him and sent him flying with the Reds.

"wow, she knocked the black right off of you." Sarge commented.

"that's racist." the black object muttered. It was Tucker she flung at the Chief.

"just shoot that damn bitch!" John snarled.

"fire in the hole!" Simmons yelled, firing his rocket launcher. Tex ran into a teleporter, the rocket following her. She then jumped out of another one and ran back towards the Reds.

"are you fucking kidding me? RUN!" Tucker screamed. John had had enough. Running forward, he plowed into Tex and activated his jetpacks. Flying straight into the air with all his speed, he slammed Tex into the ceiling with all his strength, leaving a very large print of the Freelancer agent. He then flung her across the room through several piles of steel containers, ending the fight.

"you guys still alive?" John asked. His response was a bunch of moans and groans from the beat-up Reds and Blues.

"I'll take that as a yes." John smirked.

* * *

><p><strong>Like? don't like? read and review! if you feel that the fight scene needs any help at all, just PM me!<strong>


	18. Chapter 17

**I own nothing! Enjoy!**

* * *

><p>Chapter 17<p>

May 3rd, 2553

Project Freelancer Offsite Storage Facility

Planet Alpha X-45A

Now that the smashfest was over, the Reds and Church were discussing whether to let Tex out or not. The reason was, when John flung her off to the corner, she hit with such force that it automatically sent her armor into lockdown.

"either way, we're bringing her out. Phyllis, can you bring her out of lockdown?" Church asked, now back in a human body. Or, robot human body.

"I'm sorry, the lockdown was caused by a third party. I do not have the proper abilities to remove the lockdown on armor used by Project Freelancer that is caused by a third party." the AI apologetically said.

"I know a guy. Hey Doc, we need you down here! Church wants to bring Tex outta the lockdown!" John yelled.

"it's easy, all you have to do is put in the right codes!"

"these idiots don't know what the codes are, so they can't do it! You built this armor, you know how to get her out!" John yelled.

"and have her kill us again? No thank you, dude." Grif said, holding a med kit to his sore genitals.

"she's not gonna kill us, not after what I did to her." John said.

"you're a super soldier, right? Why couldn't you do more damage to her?" Simmons asked. That stumped the Chief. Why couldn't he fight more harder?

"ten years in a gulag doesn't exactly help a soldier retain his prowess." John said.

"how 'bout sexual prowess? Bow chicka bow wow." Tucker said. He ended up flying across the building, planting himself on the steel walls. Doc Brown came down, his SMG in his hands.

"can you bring her out?" Church asked.

"alright, let me take a look. Eh, it's not that bad. Let me just get this panel off, make some specific noise and drop it on the ground." Brown said sarcastically as he brought Tex out of the lockdown.

"no need to be sarcastic. Jackass." Church muttered.

"you know, I built this armor, so I can put you on an indefinite lockdown that this AI Phyllis can't bring you out of. So please, make more comments." Brown said.

"just bring Tex out." Church said, not wanting to be stuck in lockdown forever.

"I already did." Brown said as Tex stood up.

"uh, god, did you have to throw me around like that?" Tex groaned.

"didn't leave me much of a choice, did you?" John asked.

"yeah, why'd you have to go beat everyone up?" Church asked.

"it's not my fault their not good fighters. Well, except the green giant, he gave me a good fight." Tex said.

"hey Tex, can I talk to you alone, someplace private?" Church asked. The two left, leaving the Reds, John and Doc Brown.

"wonder what that's all about." Grif asked.

"don't know, don't care. Has Kat been able to hack into the computers, find out anything more about Project Freelancer?" John asked.

"she thinks Cortana would be better to do that." Brown said. John was wondering if Kat had an ulterior motive for having Cortana hack the computers, but he did as he was told. Heading up to the main control room, he found it to be empty.

"figures." John snorted. He plugged Cortana in and let her do her work.

"anything?"

"to be honest, I'm getting the feeling that whoever's in charge of Freelancer is extremely paranoid; the records here are almost the same as the records we found at the main HQ."

"well, is there anything we can use to our advantage should we come across the Meta again? Anything?" John asked.

"there is something. A lot of journal entries made by the apparent head of Freelancer, someone called Director Church."

"let's skip those. Anything else, troop deployments, anything concerning military bases, what Freelancer really is?" John asked.

"I'm sorry, John, but there's nothing in here. At least, not what you're looking for."

"well, get a copy of everything in here, we might as well take that with is." John said. Tex and Simmons then walked in.

"what are you guys doing here?" John asked.

"Sarge wants me to put the blues back in the database." Simmons said.

"not gonna happen, that's impossible." Cortana said.

"aw man, Sarge doesn't like bad news." Simmons muttered.

"well, the console's all yours." John muttered, pulling the data-chip out and leaning in the corner, not leaving the room.

"meh, let's just ignore him." Simmons muttered. Tex and Simmons began hacking into the data-base, pulling up whatever files they could. Cortana already had them all, so John just pulled them up as well. One particular file, however, was very curious to him. It was a large Freelancer base codenamed 'Avalanche' that was of great importance not only to Project Freelancer, but to ONI SecIII as well.

"Cortana, why would Section III of the Office of Naval Intelligence show great interest in a military installation ran by Project Freelancer?" John asked.

"I don't know. If you're so curious about the base, then we should go there. Oh, I got some juicy information concerning the Freelancer Agents and the Simulation Troopers, as well as their bases." Cortana whispered.

"what is it?" John asked as Church walked in.  
>"they have psych profiles on every member except the Director, Church and Tex. Nothing on those three, it's like they don't even exist."<p>

"so what about the Simmie trooper and their bases?"  
>"they're the absolute worst of the worst; their UNSC Marines, ODST's, Army Troopers, you name it. If they have horrible scores or combat skills, then they're pulled out and thrown into Freelancer to serve as Simulation Troopers. And the bases are designed to help Freelancer agents hone their skills should another galactic war occur."<p>

"hmm. Don't tell them that, especially Sarge, let him find out on his own. What you said to Simmons, is that true?"  
>"I lied to him. Of course he can put the Blues back in, I just like screwing with him, is all." Cortana laughed.<p>

"anything about that base, it's very peculiar to me." John asked.

"to be honest, the only thing I know about that base is what I found in these files, ONI kept it out of my reach."

"hmm. Looks Church and Tex are interested in that base as well." John muttered, leaving the room. He headed to the armory and stocked up on weapons and ammo. Surprisingly enough, there were no Desert Eagles.

"Brown said that the M6 Magnum was completely replaced by the Desert Eagle. You think they just dumped 'em all on Freelancer to use?" John asked, slapping two M6D Magnums on his side.

"more than likely." Tex soon joined him, stocking up on weapons as well.

"you going somewhere?" John asked.

"you're going to that base, right?" Tex asked.

"that's right. Something about it interests me. Why are you going there?" John asked.

"I'm going there for answers." the two didn't speak after that as they locked and loaded on guns and ammo. When they were finished, they headed out to the main room where the 141 was gathered about.

"you two going to do some serious hunting?" Eddie Buck asked.

"hilarious, sergeant. And in a manner of speaking, yes, we are." John snarled.

"what, wait. Where are you going?" Church asked.

"we're leaving, Church." Tex said.

"you're going to that frozen base, aren't you? The both of you?" Church asked.

"I need to know more about myself, Church. And I'm not gonna find out sitting on my ass here, with you." Tex snarled.

"well, why don't we come with you?" Church asked, hopeful the 141 would tag along.

"they're not gonna come with me, and I don't blame 'em. If they wanna stay here, then that's they're choice. I'm not gonna stop 'em." John said sternly.

"look, no offense. But I need people with military training. More specifically, people who understand the military training. You guys are just gonna end up slowing us down. And if the rest don't wanna come, then we won't force 'em to go." Tex said.

"you know what, fuck it. We don't wanna go anyway." Grif said.

"yeah, good luck on your mission to the empty base guarded by tons of military dudes who are out to find you, anyway." Tucker said sarcastically.

"well I'm going, and you and the Chief aren't gonna stop me." Church said forcefully.

"you know what? Fine, you can come with us. We can use you anyway." Tex said smoothly.

"how the hell are you guys gonna get there anyway? This planet don't have any snow, and no way Captain Keyes is gonna let you walk away." Roebuck said.

"there's an ONI prowler parked out back, I spotted it when we came in. figured I could use it for something. Cortana can fly it. So that solves the transportation issue. Got any more dazzlingly idiotic questions you wanna ask us?" John asked. No one responded. The 141 was a little pissed off at his last remark, however.

"come on, let's go." John ordered. The three soldiers headed to the prowler parked out back.

"okay Cortana, I'm afraid I lied. Do you know how to fly this thing?" John asked.

"does a grizzly bear go potty in the woods?" Cortana joked. The engines roared to life, lifting the large warship into the skies with the stealth systems still on. Captain Keyes never knew that an ONI stealth vessel left the planet.

"think we should wait for them to come back?" Sarge asked.

"you can wait if you want." Carter said coldly.

* * *

><p>May 3rd, 2553<p>

Unidentified ONI/Freelancer Base

Codename [Avalanche]

Unknown Planet

ONI Prowler EA-5B

_Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang._ four Freelancer soldiers now stood dead with a .50 cal round through their heads.

"wow, you killed all five of 'em. Did you have to do that?" Church asked.

"meh, they'll live." John replied, reloading his sniper rifle.

"no, they won't."

"doesn't matter to me." John smirked.

"let's get inside." Tex said. John and Tex ran into the base, but Church didn't.

"um, Tex, Chief, hold on a sec!" he yelled.

"what is it?" John asked impatiently.

"um... Yeah... Don't know if I mentioned this before, but I've kind of had psychic visions about this place. Yeah, I thought it was Valhalla at first, but I guess it turns out it was here... Probably should have told you this earlier." Church said sheepishly.

"yeah, you should have." Tex said angrily.

"well, I'm telling you know. Does that count?"  
>"what do you think?" John rolled his eyes.<p>

"you're not psychic, genius. You're just remembering. You've been here before. We all were, well, except him." Tex pointed to the SPARTAN. "this is where they moved Alpha. After a few of us Freelancers went rogue, we compared notes and pieced together what they were doing to him. I convinced them to come back. Break him out. The project moved him here to try to protect him, so that they could keep experimenting on him." Tex explained.

"it was you who led the break in?" John asked, a little surprised.

"I couldn't just let them destroy him. He was being tortured. The Director had even started to use some of the other AI against him. Think about that. Turning his own pieces against him? It's sick. Gamma and Omega would fabricate scenarios where he was designed to fail, and they made it seem like his failures were hurting all of the people he cared about. And there was nothing he could do about it. It drove him mad, broke him down even more."

"you didn't save him, did you?" John began to piece it together, although he still had plenty to learn.

"I didn't. It was too late. By the time I got to him, he was already long gone. I don't even think he recognized me. I failed... Only in my case, it really was my fault." Tex said sadly, remembering…..

* * *

><p>May 4th, 2553<p>

Project Freelancer Offsite Storage Facility

Planet Alpha X-45A

Back at the PFOSF, Simmons and Grif were busy experimenting with the armor enhancements they found, and Dr. Brown was helping them get it right.

"okay, let's try this one. Grif, remember, you don't have an AI, so there's nothing to run the complicated calculations needed to use this equipment. Take it easy, okay?" Brown asked.

"I was born to take it easy. Fire it up, doc." Grif said confidently. Brown flipped the switch and the armor permutation turned on.

"you feel different?" Simmons asked.

"no, kind of energetic, am I invisible? Huh? Am I? Am I- can you see me?" Grif asked, now talking very fast.

"hmm, that's not supposed to happen." Brown wondered.

"Grif, try jumping, let's see what happens." Simmons ordered. The yellow soldier jumped.

"jump! I jumped! Did that work Simmons? I can do it again! Please, let me do it again. Want me to jump again? Watch, I'll do it again, I won't even stop. Let me jump! Let me jump! Let me jump! Why aren't you answering me when I talk with my mouth!?" Grif asked.

"okay, try walking. Either this is the healing or-" Simmons didn't answer as Grif shot away at lightning speed.

"super speed." Simmons muttered. Grif ran all about the facility at high speeds. Although he wasn't as fast as a SPARTAN, he was faster than everyone else. Only the SPARTANs with their superior vision could see him. Grif came running back towards Simmons and Doc Brown and slammed into the wall.

"hey Grif, you dead yet?" Brown asked.

"ow, whoa Simmons did you see that? Did you see? I saw it! I saw it, totally! Did you see? I hit that wall! That was fast! Man that was super fast! I'm so fast! God, so fast! Why is it so hot in here?" Grif asked rapidly.

"okay, this wasn't supposed to be happening. Super speed doesn't make you talk fast, I just makes you move fast." Brown said.

"what, you knew this was gonna happen?" Simmons asked.

"the fast movement? Yes. The fast talking? No." Simmons just sighed at that.

"what in sam hell is going on here?" Sarge asked, walking up.

"hey Sarge! What's up Sarge! Simmons and Doc Brown are doing some experiments and I'm helping them Sarge! Right now we're doing one where everyone talks slow and the lights are super bright and I can smell clouds and man is it so hot in here!" Grif replied.

"we installed a speed unit on his armor. It's…. malfunctioning, at the moment. The only way to fix it is, he needs an AI, a really high IQ, or a very good understanding of the equipment." Brown said.

"well turn it off." Sarge ordered.

"these versions of the armor enhancements are run by timer, I've been trying to figure that out. We'll just have to wait for it to run out." Brown concluded.

"well, how long is that?"

"how long? What's long? I like long stuff! I knew a giraffe once, I think it was in a book. A giraffe book. The book wasn't long, but the giraffe totally was. Because of the neck, you know. You know what I mean? Do you? Do you? The part that connects the head to... the... body... I'm gonna go to sleep now." Grif slowed down and collapsed.

"did he just go crazy and fall asleep on us?" Simmons asked.

"for a first time user, that's what happens if you don't have what I listed earlier."

"well, we can't get an AI. And Grif is as dumb as they come, so he'll never understand this equipment. So he'll never use it. Which gives us an advantage." Sarge said sneakily.

"you're not using this equipment, that's final." Brown said in a very stern voice.

"fine. Grif, wake up!" Sarge yelled.

"yeah, what is it?" Grif moaned.

"I want you and Simmons to go through the data base and hack it. Put the Blues back in so we can continue our war!" Sarge ordered.

"yes sir!" Simmons the kissass replied. Grif just sighed. Up in the main command center,

"that is not an approved operation-hey, watch it, buddy!" Phyllis yelled.

"can you show me the data logs?" Simmons asked.

"affirmative." she replied.

"Simmons, any luck in restoring the Blues?" Sarge asked.

"It's a lot of data entry Sir. I was thinking I could hack the mainframe and reroute the data stream to-" Simmons began.

"or, we could just restore it from an archive database." Phyllis interrupted.

"what?"  
>"this is an off-site fallback facility. It is designed to have archives in case of data loss. Blue Team rosters would certainly be a part of that."<p>

"really?" Simmons asked, surprised.

"yes. In fact, I am glad you pointed out the database anomaly. I had noticed it before, but did not have time to investigate. Strange."

"oh. Yeah, okay then. Restore them." Simmons said, a little degraded that a computer had finally beat him.

"done."

"great."

"you seem disappointed. Did I do it too quickly, and make you look bad?"  
>"no, it's not that-"<p>

"Simmons, stop complaining and move aside, let me look." Grif said, searching through the folders. "hmm." he wondered.

"what is it?" Sarge asked.

"this is weird, if I'm reading this right, there's a bunch of other red and blue bases." Grif said.

"of course there is, the war is huge! The fate of the entire galaxy rests in the balance!" Sarge said proudly and blindly.

"or it's not."

"come again?"

"here, look at this. I'm looking at the list of missions for all the different bases, and some of them look... Familiar."

"hey, let me see. Huh, apparently they set up bases in various locations on different planets and then sent in a Freelancer in for... training purposes." Simmons said confused.

"training purposes?" Sarge asked.

"practice." Grif said.

"practice?" Sarge asked, a little horrified.

"yeah, the reds and blues are there just to test the skills of Freelancer agents."

"you mean the blues." Sarge reinforced.

"no, both the reds and blues. It says here that 'simulation bases will present scenarios that may occur for Freelancer agents in a galactic battle field.' " Simmons read out loud.

"in English, please." Sarge demanded.

"he means we're lab rats for the Freelancers to use." Grif replied.

"what- what- that's nonsense! We've been through so much! We had that, whole battle with the Blues for the, something I can't remember, then we set off that bomb thingy, and we got blasted through time, and we met an alien and that guy got pregnant." Sarge protested desperately.

"according to this, that is simulation number three." Simmons replied.

"THREE?!" Sarge yelled, horrified at this new revelation.

"why us, though?" Grif asked.

"let me look. Okay, says here that 'bases are outfitted with matching weapons and vehicles to ensure long conflict and are staffed by... low level operatives?' " Simmons asked.

"low level? Stupid report. Simmons, punch it." Grif asked, insulted. Simmons continued, ignoring his Red Team comrade.

"the candidates for Red and Blue squads will be culled from men and women enlisted in the UNSC Marine Corp, the UNSC Army Troopers, and the Orbital Drop Shock Trooper Corp, based on low test scores and poor field skills so as to not be missed on our-" Simmons read some more.

"hey, does sound a lot like me. What about you, I thought you were smart. Did you have low test scores as well?" Grif asked.

"hey, those time limits aren't fair, it should be important that I know the information, not how fast I know it." Simmons defended.

"guess I hit a nerve." Grif muttered beneath his breath.

"and don't get me started on the #2 pencils."

"well Sarge, looks like I was right! I always said Command was full of-Sarge?" Grif asked. The red team staff sergeant was now gone.

"we should go look for him." Simmons said, picking up his BR55HB rifle. After a moment of searching, they found Caboose building what appeared to be a fort, but was completely indescribable by the human language. Or any language for that matter.

"hey Caboose, where's Sarge?" Simmons asked.

"go away!" Sarge yelled, depressed and angry.

"Sarge, what is all this?" Simmons asked.

"Simmons, didn't you hear? We're cannon fodder. Practice! Well if I'm the leader of junk, I may as well have a base made out of junk! Pretty appropriate, right?" Sarge asked.

"looks like shit." Grif muttered.

"that was rhetorical, dirt bag!" Sarge scolded.

"well sir, I think this is an excellent strategy. The blues will never-"

"the blues? Don't you get it, Simmons?! Grif was right all along!" Sarge yelled.  
>"thank you, sir."<p>

"don't call me that."

"Sarge, this place is one lie after another. We don't know if-"

"oh we know. I know, you wanna keep deluding yourself, go ahead! And don't call me sir! From now call, call me by name: Sarge. Or S-Dog. I ain't in charge anymore, so I quit!" Sarge yelled, walking away.

"what's going on here?" Carter asked, walking up.

"Sarge just found out that the red and blue armies are just cannon fodder for the Freelancers to use, so he's suffering a mental and emotional breakdown." Grif said, which was rather accurate.

"alright then." Carter walked away.

"what are you doing?" Simmons asked.

"I'm packing it all in, my mission's over. I'm leaving."

"you're leaving? What about the Chief? What about Cortana and Tex? And Church?" Simmons asked.

"they're not my problem anymore." Carter said coldly.

* * *

><p>May 4th, 2553<p>

Unidentified ONI/Freelancer Base

Codename [Avalanche]

Unknown Planet

"Tex, stop. Where are you two going?" Church asked.

"there's only one person who knows what happened to me, Church. The Director."

"but no one knows who he is, or where he is!" Church protested.

"I can think of two people who know: Washington and the Meta. I want the Director as well, he'll know everything about this facility." John said bluntly.

"Wash and the Meta? Tex, are you kidding me? What if they don't know?"

"then I'll kill them and destroy everything the Director built. Freelancer, all the different programs, everything."

"Tex, I think the Director built all this for you."

"another reason to burn it all to the ground." Tex said in disgust.

"look, facing Wash and the Meta is suicide. Even if we know where they are. And we don't. how the hell are we gonna find them?" Church asked.

"easy, they're coming to us." John said, pulling out his Desert Eagle and shooting Church in foot. He collapsed on the ground, bleeding out motor oil and engine coolant.

"we needed you to come along. Phyllis said the recovery beacon wouldn't activate unless we left the facility." John rumbled.

"Tex?" Church asked, horrified.

"I didn't want to be paired with you, I didn't even want to come back. But I'm here now, so I'll make use of the time I got."

"Tex, I coulda helped you. Both of you." Church groaned.

"you can't even help yourself! That's why you made me, Church. You made me to take on all the things you can't handle, just like you always have! Well guess what, I'm gonna handle it! By myself! Wash and Meta will be coming now. I have some things to get ready." Tex scolded.

"then why is he here?"  
>"I came along because something about this base interests me. If the Meta and Wash know anything about it, all the better." John muttered, grabbing his explosives.<p>

"Tex, why are you doing this?" Church coughed.

"funny you should ask. I wanna find that out myself." Tex said before running off.

* * *

><p>May 4th, 2553<p>

Project Freelancer Offsite Storage Facility

Planet Alpha X-45A

In the main control room, Phyllis picked up an emergency beacon.

"alarm. Incoming recovery beacon. Level Zero. Alarm. Incoming recovery beacon."

"oh no!" Caboose yelled, running out of the room. After running through several hallways, he ran to the main storage area where the Red Team was at their makeshift fort.

"sergeant! Sergeant!" he yelled.

"what do you want, Blue?" Sarge asked.

"I need your help."

"our help?" Simmons asked.

"yes, Church is hurt. They must've gotten to him, the big green man, and Tex."

"they got Tex? Good, that means she won't beat the shit outta us anymore." Grif said happily.

"no, we have to rescue them."

"rescue them? Are you nuts? No one told them to leave, they're on their own!" Grif retorted.

"but they'll die! Sergeant, please!" Caboose begged.

"uh hey dude, I don't know if you've picked up on this yet, but if you wanna convince Sarge to do anything, I don't think the best argument is, 'the blues might die if we don't.' " Grif said.

"cowboy up, Caboose, I'm coming with you." Sarge said, cocking his shotgun for emphasis.

"what?"

"I said I'm helping him."

"who, the blue guy? Why on earth would you ever help a blue?" Grif was confused by this turn of events.

"we need some weapons. Simmons, how'd your equipment test go?"

"as good as you'd expect it to go."

"hmm, that's too bad."

"well I'm not going, and you can't make me. You quit, remember? I don't take orders from you any more, and besides, this whole command structure thing was bullshit anyway. We all know that now." Grif said angrily.

"I'm not telling you to go. I ain't even asking."

"you're not?"  
>"nope. I'm going. That's it, final. You wanna come, come on. But I don't expect you to, Simmons will probably tell us, that statistically, some of us will probably die."<p>

"actually, all of us will die." Simmons corrected.

"all of us will die. But that's not what's important. Let me ask you two a question: _You ever wonder why we're here_?" Sarge asked. Simmons and Grif stared at each other.

"it is one of life's great mysteries." Grif said finally.

"no, I mean you! What are you doing here? You always act like you wanna quit, but hell, you could've left whenever you wanted. No-one would have stopped ya. So why are you here? And you, Simmons."

"me?"

"you say you wanna be in charge. They would have given you your own squad a dozen times over. You know it, and I know it. But you're still, here. And you Tucker." the aqua soldier walked up with his sword out. "as much as I hate to admit it, you're actually good at being a soldier."

"I am?"  
>"I know you like to make your rude comments, pretend like it all doesn't matter. But an entire alien race chose you to be their hero! So why are you here? And Caboose…" Sarge couldn't find anything to say about him. "um, it's good to see you."<p>

"thanks. I'm really enjoying the speech so far."

"and you SPARTAN's and ODST's?" Sarge asked the Task Force 141, who, oddly enough, hadn't left yet. "why are you guys still here? You always talk about how the Chief isn't your problem any more, and that you always want to leave him behind! Well, I've spotted a dozen chances when you could've left him behind! And yet, you're all, still, here. Maybe you're all here because this is the only place you fit in. Maybe you're here because you don't have anywhere else to go. Maybe you're all here, because deep down, you want to be here. The reason doesn't matter. What matters is that you're here! For all we know, Tex, Church, the Chief and Cortana are dead. That means we're the only ones who know what's happened; the only ones who can prevent them from covering it up. So the way I figure it, these Freelancer guys, wanna use us, take us away from our families, and send us all over the dag gum galaxy just to test if their agents are ready for the big fight? Well, I guess I'm interested in showing 'em, exactly what a big fight is all about. Time to clean the slate. So I'm not ordering you to go. I ain't even asking. You do, what you gotta do Private Grif." Sarge concluded his rallying speech. The 141 realized something; why hadn't they left? Maybe Sarge was right. They had plenty of plans to knock him out, but they never implemented them. They had plenty of chances they coulda climbed back on the Morning Sun and left the Chief behind, but they never did. They coulda just told the Admiralty that he was dead or captured, they would've believed that.

"I'll go get my car keys." Grif sighed.

"we're coming with you, Sarge. All of us." Carter said.

"ah, alright then. Let's move."

"still, I don't think a Warthog is gonna get us there. But I spotted something in the hanger deck that can carry us all." Carter said. The 141, the Reds and Blues went to the main hanger deck where they saw their mode of transport.

"we'll take this up to the ship. We'll use this to carry us all there." Carter said.

"who the hell's gonna drive this?" Grif asked. Everyone stared at him.

"why is everyone looking at me?" Grif came to the conclusion that he would be driving.

"Captain Keyes, prep up the FTL engines. We're going after the Chief and Cortana, we're gonna save their butts." Carter radioed.

"aren't they with you?"  
>"didn't you see an ONI prowler leave this base?"<p>

"I thought I did, thought the sensors were outta tune. Alright, bring everyone up here, we'll follow their trail." Keyes ordered. Over at the dig site, Wash, Doc and the Meta overheard everything.

"come on, let's get in that frigate and get there before they do. We're finishing this, once and for all." Wash ordered.

* * *

><p>May 4th, 2553<p>

Unidentified ONI/Freelancer Base

Codename [Avalanche]

Unknown Planet

UNSC Aegis Fate

Down at Avalanche, a lone Warthog roared across the snow and ice to the recovery beacon activated by Church's damaged suit.

"there he is. Something doesn't seem right, though. Stop the car." Wash ordered.

"stop?"  
>"I don't like this. How'd he get hurt, why isn't anyone helping him?" Wash wondered. The Meta just snarled.<p>

"you're right. It's a trap. Those walls there, perfect for a sniper. We walk to where he's hurt and we get popped."

"you think the Reds are ambushing us?" Doc asked.

"the Reds? Yeah right, this is an actual military tactic. We drilled it all the time in training. No, whoever set this up is a Freelancer." Wash concluded.

"yeah, but if a Freelancer set this up, wouldn't they know that you guys were Freelancers, and that you would recognize this as soon as you saw it?" Doc asked.

"what? No, you're over thinking it. That's just-" Wash never finished as a perfect ring of anti-tank mines activated around the Warthog.

"son of a bitch." Wash sighed.

"told you so." Doc smirked. The mines went off, destroying the Warthog. Wash coughed as he struggled to stand. Falling back in the snow, he stared at his bloodied hands and looked up in the distance. He saw a black figure quickly moving toward him.

"it can't be… Tex?" he asked himself. He quickly reached for his rifle, but a black armored boot pinned his arm.

"you're supposed to be dead." Wash spat.

"don't sound so disappointed, you'll make me cry. Where's the director?" Tex asked, aiming her rife at Wash's head.

"the director? How would I know that?"

"wrong answer." Tex replied. Suddenly, the Meta tackled her to the ground, but he found himself being wrenched off by an angry SPARTAN. John slammed a lethal punch to the Meta's chest, kneed him in the head, and kicked him in the back, sending him flying. Pressing a detonator, an M41 chain-gun flew out from the snow right into John's hands.

"you take on Wash, I'll take care of the Meta." John yelled, firing the gun at the large soldier. The Meta quickly ran behind a large pillar of ice, protecting himself from the bullets. John dropped the gun and fired off several HE grenades with his China Lake, chewing away at the Meta's cover. The Meta pulled out his Magnum and fired, doing no damage to the Chief's shields. John pulled out his Desert Magnum and fired, the large rounds slamming through the shields and boring themselves through the Meta's thick armor. Agent Washington flew by, slamming into the Meta and sending him back into the mountain.

"ready?" Tex asked.

"ready." John muttered, pulling out another detonator.

"is that a-" the mountain behind them blew.

"MOUNTAIN?!" Wash yelled horrified. As the large pieces of ice began falling, the four soldiers continued to wage battle. Wash attempted to stab Tex with the memory unit, but Tex quickly avoided him. John picked up a large slab of ice and easily flung it at the Meta. It only slowed down his advance. Taking advantage, John ran forward, grabbed the Meta and body slammed him into the ice. Picking him up, he grabbed his leg in a iron-like grip and proceeded to slam him into the ice, over and over.

"I hate to interrupted your little smashfest here, Chief, but the mountain is indeed falling on us. You might wanna run." Cortana said jokingly.

"you don't think I know that?" John muttered, tossing the Meta into another massive block of ice. Avoiding Washington's rifle fire, John joined up Tex behind some cover and returned fire.

"hit it!" John yelled. Tex pulled out a detonator and pressed the button. Massive explosions were heard and the ground shook. Tex and John ran for safety. Tex got hit in the back, sending her down. John accidentally stepped on an exploded mine, sending him flying into the wall, knocking him out.

"oh my god. RUN!" Wash screamed as the piece of land he was one began to fall. the Meta simply flung his Brute Shot in the wall and used it to climb up.

"hey Wash, here! Over here!" Doc yelled, holding the tow hook to the destroyed Warthog.

"throw it! Throw it!" Wash yelled. Doc did, but it pitifully fell straight down.

"you've got to be kidding me." Wash muttered. As he climbed up the rope, the Meta fired several shots at the mountain, causing more ice and snow to call on the unconscious SPARTAN. With him out of the way, he ran towards Tex with the capture unit.  
>"Meta, wait! We don't need to hurt her, we only need to-" he never finished as he slammed the unit into Tex's face, draining the robot body of the AI. Church, Wash, and Doc thought they heard the Meta scream 'training was a long time ago, bitch!'<p>

"no!" Church yelled as the Meta flung Tex's body away.

"let her outta that thing!" Church yelled.

"we can't, the unit's failing. Epsilon, you're coming with us." Wash said, leaving John-117 to freeze to death.

"I'm not going anywhere with you! We can fight you!" Church yelled.

"we can?" Doc asked.

"we will."

"aw nuts."

"that's too bad. Meta, gimme the unit. Meta?" Wash asked. Overcome by lust for another AI, the Meta put the unit on his back and activated his invisibility armor ability.

"dammit! Doc, protect Epsilon!" Wash yelled.

"what do I do?" Doc asked.

"RUN!" Wash screamed as several Brute Shot rounds flew toward him. Wash tried to fight off the large soldier, but he was blasted into the wall.

"I knew you would do this, Meta. I just can't believe.. Can't believe…." Wash trailed off as he saw an Albatross gunship with it's engine smoking fly towards them.

"I can't believe it." he sighed. Up in the dropship,

"there they are, land right next to them." Woods said.

"right. Land." Grif said slowly.

"you do know how to land this thing, don't you?" the Marine asked.

"sure, it just means stop moving, right?" Grif asked.

"EVERYONE BRACE FOR IMPACT!" Woods hollered in the rear cargo area.

"aw man, this is gonna suck!" Tucker complained.

"why'd we let Grif drive?!" Emile asked.

"I still haven't got my peanuts." Caboose said innocently. The dropship slammed into the ground, barely running over the Meta. It came to a stop right in front of Doc, just barely running him over.

"wow, that was a close one." Doc said.

"you know, I would say that was the cavalry, but I've never seen a line of horses crash into the battle field from outer space before." Wash said, walking out from behind a tree.

" hey, is it possible for a memory fragment out of an artificial intelligence program enclosed inside a robotic body to piss its pants? Because I'm pretty sure I just did that." Church said, coming out from behind the same tree.

"come on, let's see how many of your friends survived that crash."

"you know, they're not really my friends."

"that's okay, I'm pretty sure none of them really survived." at the wreckage,

"Grif, look what you did do our dropship! You told us you could fly this thing!" Carter scolded.

"meh, fuck it. It's a rental." Grif said.

"meh, your right. Fuck it." Carter muttered, kicking it off the cliff's edge.

"has anyone seen Tex?" Church asked.

"screw Tex, where's the Chief?" Jorge asked. A green figure slowly rose out of a large pile of snow, clutching his side.

"you alright John?" Brown asked, running over to his aide, along with several members of the 141.

"this is gonna ruin my day." John sighed, removing his hand to reveal that several icicles managed to punch through his armor and into his body. Blood was pouring out freely.

"punched right through the BioFoam layer as well. Alright, we can fix that." Brown said, pulling out his med kit. They looked over and saw Wash give orders to the Reds and Blues. They ran into the large base, apparently looking for something.

"there's something about this base, you guys. Something ONI wants. They're very interested in it, and so am I."

"it does look very familiar. To me, at least. I think I might have worked here maybe eight or nine years ago." Brown said, patching up the wounded soldier.

"Carter, grab the 141, you and everyone else are going inside to see what's so important about this place. You too, Doc. I can manage." John sighed. Now that it was just John, Church, Doc and Wash, John slightly limped over to the other soldiers.

"so, what is she?" John asked, referring to Tex.

"I found some of the old journals that belonged to the director. She's someone from his old life, someone he loved…"

"Alison, her name was Alison." Wash replied.

"Alison. When they made the Alpha AI, she came back. Said, they said she was a byproduct of the process."

"she's just a shadow." Wash muttered.  
>"don't call her that! She died in her real life, and that's all the Director ever remembered of her. So now, no matter how tough she is, no matter how hard she fights, she's always going to fail, because that's what she's based on. No matter what she's doing, or what she's trying to accomplish, just when her goal is within her reach, it gets yanked away. Every. Single. Time. Can you imagine what that's like?" Church asked. The memory unit rose up in the air, revealing that it was stuck in the Meta the whole time.<p>

"yeah, I'm starting to get that feeling." John and Wash muttered.

* * *

><p><strong>Enjoy? Please read and review!<strong>


	19. Chapter 18

**To all my readers, I'm rewriting Halo: Black Ops from this chapter onward. I've caught on up the Halo Universe, with Halo 4 and all, and I've also caught up on Red vs. Blue. So the rest of my story will be more intermingled with what's been going on currently in the RvB universe and the Halo universe. Hope you enjoy it.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 18<p>

May 4th, 2553

Unidentified ONI/Freelancer Base

Codename [Avalanche]

Unknown Planet

Inside the top level of the base, the Reds, Blues, and Freelancers were looking for anything that could keep Tex alive. But apparently, Grif had a short attention span.

"what are we looking for again, guys?" Grif asked.

"batteries, power cells, anything to keep the unit alive." Simmons answered.

"how is a battery different from a power cell?" Grif asked.

"Grif, now's not the time for this!" Gen. Shepherd scolded. Several explosions were heard.

"did you guys hear that?" Carter asked.

"yeah I did. Come Grif, let's go. Simmons, grab that launcher." Kat ordered.

"aren't we supposed to run away from explosions?" Grif asked as the 141 piled out into the snow. They saw the Meta firing his Brute Shot at Church and Wash, sending Church to the ground.

"what's going on?" Carter knelt down by the wounded robot.

"The Meta….. Alive…." Church coughed.

"where's the Chief?" Jun asked, readying his sniper rifle.

A cloaked figure snuck up behind the Meta and quickly tackled him. The cloak dropped to reveal it was John-117, raising his right arm with his knife in hand. The Meta blocked it with his Brute Shot and fired a round into the snow, sending the two flying. Delivering a knee to the head, the SPARTAN was down for the count. A knife was sent flying into the Meta's chest, courtesy of Agent Washington. The Meta simply returned fire with his weapon, sending his opponent into the ground.

"and I was afraid we wouldn't get to kick a little ass today. Come on, fellas!" Sarge yelled.

"Caboose! Stay with Church!" Tucker ordered.

"okay."

"and try not to kill him by accident!"

"okay!" the retarded soldier yelled.

"attack!" Sarge yelled, firing his shotgun.

"get him!"

"we're gonna fucking die!" Grif yelled, not wanting to fight. The 141 let loose with their weapons. The Meta, however, pulled out a bubble shield, protecting him from the bullets, grenades and rockets. Once it was down, he jumped in the air.

"fire in the hole!" Simmons and Mickey yelled, firing their M41 rocket launchers. The Meta dodged both missiles, slamming on the ground and splitting Simmons launcher in half. Emile pulled out his kukri and slammed it into the Meta's neck. The Meta simply beat the SPARTAN-III to the ground. Now that his shield was down, everyone immediately fired on the Meta. His thick armor, however, shrugged off most of the rounds. Grif jumped on the Meta's back, making the larger soldier struggle. The Meta simply grabbed Grif and ripped him off, tossing him away like he was nothing. Grif managed to take away his Brute Shot, however. Sarge tackled the Meta, but he wasn't heavy enough to actually send him to the ground. The Meta simply grabbed Sarge by the leg and flung him around, sending him flying at Simmons. Polonsky jumped up and stabbed his bayonet into his neck. With the barrel still aligned, he fired all 8 rounds before switching to his Desert Eagle. Before he could squeeze another shot, the Meta kicked him away while ripping the M1 Garand rifle off him. Two Covenant Energy Swords, courtesy of Tucker and the Arbiter, suddenly found themselves in the Meta's upper torso. Jorge jumped up and tackled the Meta, using his weight to send him to the ground. The Meta, however, slammed his fist between Jorge's legs, causing him to fall to the ground. Picking up the larger soldier, he flung the SPARTAN around like he was nothing. Grabbing his Desert Eagle, Jorge fired off three rounds before he found himself flying into the ice wall. Before the Meta turned his attention towards the others, a shotgun blast distracted him.

"come here you big son of a bitch!" Sarge yelled. The two soldiers slowly walked toward each other, Sarge rhythmically firing his weapon at he large soldier.

"what's he doing?" Emile asked.

"looks like he's trying to kill himself." Grif muttered.

"oh no!" Simmons yelled. Sarge charged the Meta, firing one last shot. The Meta dodged it and grabbed Sarge by the neck, choking him.

"hey Grif! I lost my shotgun! What the hell am I gonna do without my shotgun?! Shotgun, dammit! Shotgun!" Sarge yelled.

"shotgun. Simmons, Emile, help me with this." Grif said, realizing what Sarge was gonna do.

"hey Meta, settle a bet for me, while ya? Does that thing look like a giant cat to you?" Sarge growled, putting the tow hook to the destroyed Warthog.

"come on, Grif, push!" Emile yelled.

"I am pushing!" Grif yelled back. The warthog fell off the cliff, causing the Meta to be dragged towards the edge. At the last moment, however, Sarge ripped off the Epsilon unit. The Meta was dragged to the cliff's edge. Once he got there, however, he grabbed Grif's leg and dragged him as well. Emile jumped down and grabbed Grif's arm.

"Emile, Simmons, help!" Grif yelled. Emile then spotted something.

"oi! My knife!" Emile yelled, ripping out his kukri from the Meta's neck-and letting go of Grif, causing him to fall.

"SIMMONS!" Grif screamed as he fell.

"he's… gone…" Simmons said, not believing what just happened.

"yes. Grif is dead. It's a sad day. But he died as he lived; flat on his belly, trying to get someone to do his work for him. He will be missed, until we get a replacement, and then forgotten immediately." Sarge said happily.

"I just can't believe he's dead." Simmons sniffled.

"you know, sometimes, when somebody falls off a cliff in movies, he's actually just over the edge, hanging on a tree branch or something." MacTavish suggested.

"nope, he's definitely dead." Sarge retorted, wanting to believe that Grif was dead.

"maybe we should look, just in case." Simmons agreed with MacTavish.

"I think looking would get our hopes up, and Grif wouldn't like that. Grif would want our expectations to be as low as possible. Let's honor him by not looking. And then have a nice lunch. I'm thinking Monte Cristo sandwich." Sarge said, completely ignoring the mohawked Scottish UNSC Major.

"are you sure, I could just peek over the edge." Simmons said.

"sounds like a waste of time."

"wouldn't take me a second."

"nope." Sarge said, not wanting to see if Grif was alive.

"OH FOR GODS SAKE, JUST LOOK OVER THE DAMN EDGE! I CAN'T HOLD ON MUCH LONGER!" Grif angrily screamed.

"Grif! Dangling on the jog again, I see! Dang it, I hate cliffhangers!" Sarge yelled, greatly disappointed that Grif was still alive.

"oh, just pull me up." Grif growled. Once he was up, they found Dr. Brown tending to the Chief. His helmet was off, he had a broken nose, a busted lower lip, and a nasty cut to his forehead, causing blood to flow in his eyes.

"how is he, doc?" Carter asked.

"he'll live. Just need to patch him up."

"hey, what are they doing?" Kat asked, now noticing the Simulation troopers. Epsilon suddenly disappeared inside the capture unit Washington had brought. After a few seconds, the device shut off.

"what do you think he did?" Dempsey asked.

"don't know, don't care. Hey doc, can you take care of these for me?" John asked, pulling out several data-chips from his armor. "these are the A.I. fragments from the Alpha A.I., including the Alpha himself. I want you to destroy them." John said.

"why? and when did you get them?" Carter asked.

"remember when I used my jetpack to fly back into Freelancer Command HQ? I assaulted the Meta and grabbed all the A.I.'s from his armor. I thought there would be a reason to keep them, but... considering everything we've gone through, I can't think of a very decent one. Just destroy them, doc. I wanna be rid of this Freelancer business." John sighed.

"I'll take care of it." Doc Brown pulled out a semi-large data-pad and slipped in the data-chips. After tapping in a few commands, the screen flashed a dark orange color. "it's done. all these A.I.'s are now destroyed. gone." Brown sighed.

"can I ask you guys something? why'd you come back to rescue me? Me, Cortana, Tex, Church? Why?" John asked, looking up at his squadmates.

"well, we did have plenty of reasons, plenty of chances to leave you. I guess... I guess there's still a small part of us that feels loyal to your command." Veronica said.

"some small part? You bastards left me to rot in prison for ten years, where the hell was your loyalty then?" John asked very bitterly, standing up. "please, tell me why you did it. Make me understand."

"John, we only did that because you were getting out of control. We honestly thought putting you behind bars would help." Carter said, finally confessing as to why they did it. Before John could offer up a rebuttal,

"Commander Carter, it's Captain Keyes." came the voice of the Morning Sun CO.

"go ahead, captain." John and Carter replied at the same time. the two looked at each other, breaking out into a light chuckle. No words needed to be said; Somehow, John-117 was now back in command of the Task Force 141. Right where he belonged.

"I got a couple of UNSC Frigates heading our way. I'm cloaking the ship right now, I suggest the Task Force hide. From what I've heard, looks like an investigation team is landing down to investigate what happened down there. I'd rather you men and women not get involved."

"roger that captain, we'll hide. Any chance you can snipe those ships outta the sky?" John asked, picking up his helmet.

"if they spot me, or do anything suspicious, then I'll do that. But get your asses moving, they're launching Pelicans right now."

"okay, we're on the move. I want everyone to hide in these rocks. UNSC personnel are coming down, and I don't want to get involved." John ordered. As the 141 hid in the snow and rocks,

"doesn't it seem odd that Captain Keyes wants us to hide from UNSC personnel?" Cortana asked.

"maybe. But let's wait and find out. See what happen. Cortana, send a message to the Reds and Blues. After our new friends leave, we're heading into this bunker. See what's inside." Carter ordered.

"already on it."

* * *

><p>May 4th, 2553<p>

Unidentified ONI/Freelancer Base

Codename [Avalanche]

Unknown Planet

"finally. thought they would never leave." Nikolai Belinski muttered, his lips touching his vodka bottle for the 20th time in the past 15 minutes.

"okay, you guys can come out now!" Washington yelled. The Task Force 141 decloaked and walked away from the snow-covered wall.

"so, what's going on?" John asked.

"well, looks like we're free to go! oh, and they took away the Blue guy also." Sarge said.

"okay. Doc Brown said there was something in here that he wants to find out. Top off your weapons, let's see what's in here." John ordered, slamming a fresh clip into his rifle. After gingerly putting his helmet back on, he led the group of soldiers into the frozen base. Which was more like a limp.

"any reason you have a limp?" Simmons asked. "probably from the Meta." John sighed. But he had to wonder, why did his body feel so weird? The last time he felt this way was after he received his augments when he was 18 years old. _Damn, was it really that long ago? I'm getting old. Must be the Element 115 that's kept me alive... _the veteran SPARTAN thought. His age wasn't the only thing on his mind, however. "Cortana, are you hearing that?" John whispered.

"hearing what?"

"those numbers. you hear anything?" John asked.

"nope. nothing. you sure you're not going crazy on me?" she asked. John would've smiled at that, but instead let out a rather dangerous growl that simply told Cortana that he wasn't in the mood for her playfulness.

"I'm serious, John, I wasn't joking. You okay?" she asked. "I'm fine." John lied. As they continued down the dark hallways, John couldn't help but notice that the hallways looked more like a UNSC Frigate then an actual military base. Wanting to get some answers, "you said you worked here eight years ago, right? I wanna know what's so special about this base that Freelancer and ONI are so interested in it. Tex said this is where they tortured the Alpha AI. And back at the offsite facility, the records stated that ONI was interested in this place as well. What's in here that's so special?" John asked, spitting out blood.

"alright, I'm not supposed to say what's in here, but if you want the answers, I might as well tell you. I heard about Project Freelancer about 2 months after you were sent to jail. I got very interested in it, but they kept a lot of things from me, the THOR armor, for example. About eight years ago, I heard rumors about what was happening at this base. So once Project Freelancer abandoned it, I led in an ONI research team to find out what was going on."

"you wanna tell us what's down here?" Grif asked. The Doc had ignored him, however. He suddenly remembered what was down here.

"hey John, remember when we picked you up from the jungle, nearing the end of the war, after we fought at that dam? Remember when I said I had a project that would benefit both you and Cortana?" Brown asked.

"yeah, I remember that, you never told me what that was."  
>"keep going down this hallway, then take the main cargo elevator to the left. Once we're all the way to the bottom, I'll show you what it is." Brown said, standing up. Everyone followed Brown into another elevator, going deeper into the base. The temperature got colder as well.<p>

"what, no heating down here?" Dempsey asked.

"we never put in a heating unit, it's rather vital for what went on down here."

"is there Flood down here? Because if that's true, then I'm high-tailing it outta here." Nikolai said. Surprisingly enough, he wasn't drinking his vodka. Because he downed the last of his bottles back on the ship, and he wouldn't get another shipment of vodka for another three weeks.

"no, there's no Flood down here. What made you think that?"

"I guess I'm just paranoid. And drunk. Paranoid and drunk, not a good combo. Wait a minute, my hands do not shake, my eyesight is clear, AH! I'M SOBER!" Nikolai screamed in horror. Everyone ignored him.

"no, it's not Flood. It's something else. Something that John and Cortana will like very much." Everyone didn't know what he was talking about. They all headed down a long hallway large enough to accommodate a Warthog; everyone noticed the frost on the floor, the walls and ceilings. They passed an interrogation room, making mostly everyone wonder why this place need such a room. They passed through a final set of doors and entered a large, somewhat dark room. Washington had a bad feeling that he knew what this place was, but couldn't quit put his finger on it.

"great Doc, you led us into a dark and dreary room; I hate these kind of rooms." Dempsey muttered.

"no I didn't." Brown replied, flipping the switch. A large medical facility of some sort came before their eyes. There was a body lying on one of the beds, along with some equipment that didn't seem familiar to them.

"alright. Let me explain. John, you wanna know what my project was? After I made Cortana metastable, I thought of bringing that even further, I thought, if I can make an AI metastable, why I can't I take it further, put that AI in a human body? Seeing as a 'smart' AI is perfectly flash cloned from it's user, dead or alive, everything is in sync; especially the brain. Can you guess what my project was?"

"you were gonna make Cortana human." John said, putting the pieces of the puzzle together. The 141 was stunned at that revelation.

"I was. But with the war and all, I focused all my research into building weapons. And besides, the ship needed an AI, and she fit that role perfectly."

"so when did you start all this?"

"about 6 years after you were imprisoned. I got the DNA from Halsey, but I never told her what I was doing, I didn't want her to interfere with my plans. You may think she's the best with genetics, but even I know that flash-cloning little kids would end up in disaster. I even did it behind Parangosky's back. I found this place a while back, and I figured it would be the perfect spot to start that project. But I had completely forgotten about this base until I saw the picture of it and started to remember."

"so, you're saying you can turn Cortana into a real, flesh-and-blood human being?" Jorge asked slowly.

"yes, that is exactly what I'm saying. That's completely up to her, however." Cortana was shocked. She had no idea this was even possible.

"I'll do it. I... Emmett... I can't thank you enough for this." Cortana slightly stammered, still in shock. John removed his helmet and gave the data-chip to Brown. But when Doc Brown grabbed the data-chip, John refused to let go. Instead, he dropped the helmet and pulled out his Desert Eagle, pointing it at the older man's chest. "no funny business, Doc." John growled, cocking his gun. "I won't do anything, I know how much you love her." Doc Brown said softly. As he installed the data-chip into the main console, John pulled the covers back and examined the body, which had blonde hair, extremely beautiful features, and curves with very double-D breasts that would make _any _straight man stare. Despite his armor, John felt his manhood move down in his genital region. He couldn't help but have perverted thoughts as he thought of what he and Cortana would do to each other, sexual wise.

"alright, let's do this." Brown whispered, tapping a button on the keyboard, accidentally knocking a large wrench to the floor. After what seemed like an eternity for John-117, Cortana slowly opened her eyes, revealing them to be bright blue.

"Doc, if this really is a dream, I want you to shoot me." John said in awe.

"it's not a dream, I promise you. This is all real, definitely real." Brown said with a smile.

"hey John." Cortana said weakly. John immediately grabbed her in a hug, being extremely careful not to crush her.

"ladies and gentleman, we have successfully an artificial intelligence into a living, breathing, human being. Wish it was under better circumstances." Brown said, drinking his scotch. This was truly history in the making. Richtofen, however, had his own plans with this technology.

"hey Dr. Brown, is it possible to create an AI from a dead body?" the Nazi asked.

"you're not creating AI's from all the corpses just so you can perfect your zombie army, Richtofen." Brown said quickly.

"I don't know how I can ever repay you, Doc." John and Cortana said at the same time.

"you don't have to get me anything. Well, a lifetime of scotch would be nice." Brown said, downing the last of his scotch.

"I honestly can't believe this is really happening." John said breathlessly, a smile on his face.

"neither can I. John, I have to tell you something." Cortana said, letting her right arm drop.

"what is it?"  
>"I'm sorry."<p>

"about what?" the confused soldier asked.

"about this." she said. And she truly was. But that didn't stop her from grabbing the fallen wrench on the ground and slamming it hard on John's head, sending him back and knocking him out.

"WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT FOR?!" everyone in the room asked, completely shocked and stunned by what they just witnessed.

"Johnson, Hudson, I want you two to interrogate him. He kept on asking about these numbers he kept on hearing, although I couldn't hear anything. I'm pretty sure he asked everyone else about these numbers." Cortana said, throwing the blanket off and standing up, revealing her 100% naked self.

"so, you want us to interrogate him? In case you haven't noticed, he hates us right now, so the first chance he get's, he'll kill us." Johnson, puffing on his cigar.

"I don't think so. He had over a month to kill you all, but he never did. I think, in his own way, he was trying to give you all a second chance."

"there was that interrogation room we saw there." Carter suggested.

"alright, let's do it there." Hudson sighed.

"just one thing." Brown muttered. He knelt down and put something in John's SPARTAN neural interface.

"what's that?" Washington asked.

"it's brain scanner and analyzer, my version anyway. With this, I can tell what the hell went on in his brain for the past 10 years, see what happened to him in Vorkuta. Oh, and I'll put this in him as well." Brown muttered, putting a needle in his neck.

"what's that?" Cortana asked.

"sleeping serum, my own, specialized brand. It'll keep him under. You hit him hard, but he'll wake up soon. The longer we keep him asleep, the better. Besides, the time he's out, it'll give me plenty of time to find out what's wrong with him. Gimme John's helmet." after receiving it, he put it on and waited. After a couple of seconds,

"he's not crazy. He really is hearing numbers. It's coming from his helmet; whoever's doing this must be really good with communications. Whether it's long or short range, I don't know. Let me just go over these scans and I'll tell what's wrong with him." Brown said, rotating the brain scanner in his hands.

"alright, let's see what's he knows." Carter sighed. Noble Team picked up the sleeping SPARTAN and carried him away. Very slowly, however, considering just how heavy he was. While they were leaving, Brown opened up a locker and gave Cortana her clothes. Lacy black panties and a black bra, a pair of tight blue jeans, a black t-shirt that clung to her torso _very_ well which said in white, 'UNSC NavSpecWarfare', a black leather jacket, and a pair of black thigh-high boots with a 7 inch stiletto heel.

"a military installation? you sure?" Cortana joked as she zipped up her boots.

"you know how to use this?" Doc Brown asked, giving her his Desert Eagle. Cortana expertly took apart and re-assembled the pistol rather quickly. Not as fast as a blind-folded SPARTAN, but still quick.

"you'll do fine. come on, let's go see what's wrong with your boyfriend." Brown smirked. Cortana blushed a little bit at that comment. "come on, we all know how you feel about him. He has the same feelings for you as well."

"I do love him... but something feels different about him. Like he's not the same John that I knew before. That we all knew before." Cortana said sadly as she stared at the metal door. Doc Brown gave her a comforting hug.

"it's gonna be okay, Cortana." he lied. He didn't believe that, not one bit.

* * *

><p>After John was tied down to the single chair in the interrogation room, Doc sat down at a large computer console with the entire 141 surrounding him, plus the Reds and Blues. Everyone had noticed what Cortana was wearing, but decided not to worry about it. They had much bigger problems at the moment.<p>

"alright, let's see what's wrong with him." Brown said.

"how long is he gonna be asleep?" Shepherd asked.

"unless I wake him up, indefinitely. It's pretty potent stuff." Brown said. Heading back to the main command room, they plugged the data into the computers. Everyone clambered around the sitting doctor, all wanting to know what was wrong with him.

"okay, let me work my magic." Brown muttered. After a while of typing,

"that's odd. They put multiple memory blocks in his head."

"why?"

"I don't know. Judging from how they were installed, it was clear they wanted to keep certain memories away from him. I wonder if…" Brown muttered. He quickly searched his pockets and pulled out another data-chip.

"what's that?"

"after John rejoined the 141, he ran a physical on him. I saw certain…. Anomalies, certain things that shouldn't be in his body. I never got the chance to fully analyze them, but I'm wondering if these two incidents are related." Brown muttered. Putting in the data chip, he pulled out the data concerning John's current physical being.

"they cut right into him. Over and over again. Surgery, from the looks of it."

"well of course, when he was augmented." Jorge assured.

"the ones I'm talking about are only 5 years old, he received them in Vorkuta. And not the medical kind like if he got stabbed."

"what are you saying?" Cortana asked.

"let me look some more." Brown toyed with the data some more. After a little bit,

"they augmented him. They augmented him even further. Genetically, chemically, the whole works."

"what? Is that even possible, augmenting a SPARTAN super-soldier?" Kat asked.

"looks so. I'm gonna dig deeper, find out what they did to him." after about 30 minutes, which felt like an eternity,

"from what I can tell, they were augmenting him to be the ultimate super-soldier. The fastest, the strongest, everything. These augments prove that, only they weren't augments, not in the common sense. Looks like some organs were taken out and removed. His heart was completely removed and replaced with a purely artificial heart with the ability to pump out blood much faster and stronger then an augmented one. His bones have some sort of ceramic steel right in them, they're literally indestructible. You can't break them. His cartilage and all his muscles were, my god, all of it was replaced with force-multiplying circuits and reactive circuits. Yes, I'm talking about the same stuff you'll find in MJOLNIR armor. His kidneys, lungs, livers, and just about everything else was taken out and replaced with augmented versions of them. Much, much stronger and more durable versions. God, how the hell did he survive all that, there's no indication that they put him under or even used any painkillers. Fuck, there's not even one single drop of ibuprofen in his body. And all this is hooked up to his brain, straight up his spinal and nervous cord." everyone was stunned; who had augmented him? And why? And what did this have to do with the memory locks? As if he was a mind reader,

"I'll find out if this has to do with his memory locks. Let me see what they did to him." he was unable to remove the locks.

"whoever did this was really smart. I can't remove these locks, they'll come out over time." Brown said frustrated.

"Commander Carter, this is Captain Keyes. I'm getting something over the radio, you might wanna look into it."

"send it down here." Carter replied. The radio message was a bunch of numbers. They sounded oddly familiar to everyone, however.

"these are the numbers being sent to John's helmet. But for what purpose?" Brown muttered. He quickly typed on the console, tearing apart into John's brain, desperately trying to find what the numbers, the memory locks, and the augments had to do with each other. After 15 minutes,

"okay, I think I got it."

"got what?" Cortana asked.

"I think I got what they were trying to do to him. It looks as if there is some sort of mental program in his brain. It's waiting to be activated, but I don't know what will set it off, or what it does. I'm gonna go into that." Brown muttered. After 5 more minutes,

"oh my god." he sighed softly, staring at the screen.

"what is it?" Emile asked. The professor didn't say anything.

"doc, what is it, we need to know!" Kennedy snapped. Licking his suddenly dry lips,

"he was augmented and programmed to kill off the Task Force 141." he said slowly. Once again, silence filled the room.

"you're shitting us." Carter broke the silence.

"I wish I was, I so desperately wish I was. The programming, they'll respond to a certain set of numbers broadcasted in a certain order. The augmentations, the programming, everything supports that. And I don't think it's a theory." Brown said slowly. The 141 was stunned as they came to a horrible realization; their plan was to throw the Chief in the brig so he would get his shit together. Now, it backfired. He was augmented and programmed to kill them all.

"how will we know, what order is it?" Cortana asked.

"highest rank to lowest. It'll start off with the SPARTAN's. Carter would die first, then Kat. And so on and so forth until they're dead. Then the ODST's. Veronica, then Edward, then Dutch, you get my drift. Once they're dead, he'll just kill everyone else without bothering about their rank. Remember, they're from the past, they're not in the UNSC database. The only people he wouldn't kill is Captain Keyes, the Arbiter, Miranda, and Cortana. Everyone else is his target."

"does he know?"

"seeing as that we're all still alive, my guess is that he doesn't know. Hell, he probably doesn't know about the augments and doesn't know what he's capable of. Might explain his limp, his body's probably still trying to get used to all of it."

"what do you mean?" Johnson asked.

"Kelly-087 is the fastest SPARTAN alive. If we were to put her in the Mk. IV, she would run at a speed of 87 mph. In his current state, John-117 can run at speeds of 107 mph. And that's without the armor. Sam-034 is the strongest SPARTAN ever, his record of hitting was 2,500 PSI. That was with the armor. Currently, John can hit up to 8,500 PSI. Without the armor. So he can punch through a Hunter's shield like it was wet tissue paper. He probably doesn't even know he's capable of pulling all that off. If he did, he would've made the Meta his bitch." that wasn't re-assuring to everyone at all.

"interrogate him, find out what he knows." Carter ordered.

"what will happen to him if we put in a truth serum?" Bowman asked.

"nothing, other than make him tell the truth. I'll go administer the serum." Brown muttered. About an hour later, _why does my head hurt?_… John slowly thought as he came to, the pain in his head growing bigger and bigger. He took in his surroundings. He was in a large room, hooked up to several monitors and computer screens. He was strapped down to a steel chair with thick chains and padlocks. The room had dull, steel walls with no AC. Not that he needed it, his hatred for the 141 was what kept him warm. He was very sure of it that they planned all this, no way Cortana would do this to him.

"wake up. Wake up!" a distorted male voice boomed.

"who are you?! Where am I?!" John yelled.

"doesn't matter who I am. What matters is who you are. What's your name?"

"fuck you!" John yelled.

"where were you born?"

"kiss my fucking ass!" John defiantly bellowed.

"you are Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy John-117. You were born on Eradini II, raised on Reach to become a SPARTAN-II super-soldier. Is that correct? Is that correct?"

"yes!"

"good, we can begin."

"begin what?"

"do you remember what happened to you in Vorkuta?"

"yeah, I shot my way out and here I am." John said sarcastically.

"before that. Do you remember anything out of the ordinary, anything that shouldn't have happened?"

"nope. Now LET ME OUTTA HERE!" John yelled, tugging at the straps.

"we can't do that yet, Chief." came another distorted voice, this one more gravelly.

"why not?"

"do you remember what they did to you in Vorkuta?"

"who's they?" John asked.

"you don't remember, do you?"

"EITHER YOU LET ME OUTTA HERE OR I'M GONNA KILL EVERYONE AT THIS BASE! I MEAN IT!" John yelled angrily. Up in the booth,

"this isn't working. He's too angry at us to let us in. Doc, is there anything we can use, anything at all we can hook up to him to help him remember? What about the memory locks, can you get rid of those?"

"okay, I managed to get past the first one. And by the first one, I mean it's the very last memory lock in his head, it was put there about 4 and a half years ago. I can't tell what the memory is, but I made up a serum that will get rid of that block and speed up the process of his body flushing out the other locks."

"how long?"

"weeks, months, there is honestly no way to tell."

"alright. Let's put him under." laughing gas filled the room and, despite his bests efforts, John-117 clocked out. Dr. Brown walked in and slapped in the serum, desperately hoping it would all work. A while later, John woke up again.

"alright, we put something in you to get rid of the memory blocks. All you have to do is remember what happened to you in Vorkuta."

"fuck you, asshole!" John yelled. All the SPARTAN training came back, although this time, he couldn't fight his way out.

"okay, that's not gonna work. Does anyone know, what the hell this thing is?" picking up a cord with an odd end. Brown grabbed it.  
>"I know what it is. You plug it into his neural interface and it'll show what he's remembering on the screen over there." Brown said. Everyone in the booth was extremely pissed off that they didn't do that before.<p>

"Commander, this is the Captain. I'm getting some nuclear radiation spikes along with what appears to be slipstream radiation. It's right on the edge of this star system."

"are you saying we're under attack?"

"by hiding nukes in a slipstream field? Yes, I'd say we are. Whatever you're doing down there, finish it up."

"how long?"

"30 minutes, maybe an hour."

"Doc, you guys better finish this up. We got nukes inbound, we don't know when they'll hit us."

"knock him out again. We don't have a choice." Brown ordered. Once again, laughing gas flooded the room and John clocked out. When the gas was gone, John woke up again, feeling slightly different this time.

"okay, what did you bastards do, there's something on the back of my head! What is it?!" John yelled.

"okay, Chief, listen up. All you have to do is remember, just remember what happened to you in Vorkuta. You don't have to explain it to us, just remember." the first man said.

"I don't remember a fucking thing!" came the reply. In truth, he did remember it.

"we know you remember it, you can't lie to us, Chief." the first voice said calmly. Realizing that he had no other options, John closed his eyes, leaned his head back and remembered. The screen flickered. Three personages appeared, very fuzzy and blurred, but getting clearer and clearer. It was clear that John was remembering this from a lying down position, he was looking up at them. The three figures cleared up; everyone was stunned to find out who they were: Fleet Admiral Terrance Hood, President of Earth Calvin Millard, and Dr. Catherine Halsey.

"the subject has been successfully implanted with the knowledge to translate the number sequences and carry out his programming." Halsey said.

"then what's the problem?" Hood asked.

"his responses to our orders have been-sporadic. Unpredictable. He shows a remarkable resilience." Halsey explained.

"why?" Hood asked.

"he's very unusual... Very atypical. I hardly know of any men or women who possess such a strong will, almost as if he's holding onto something... All of our other test subjects have been far more successful." Halsey replied.

"if we were to broadcast the numbers, will he follow the orders?" Millard asked, breaking into the conversation.

"theoretically yes, but because I haven't been able to break his will, it's very possible that he'll simply ignore them."

"if he will not follow the orders embedded in the numbers, then he is of no use to us... Take him back to his cell, the bastard can rot." Hood snarled angrily. The three left the room, leaving John on the table.

"I'm never gonna get outta here." John sighed to himself.

"that's them talking, not you. You'll get out, trust me." a voice said. A figure began walking to John. It was another John-117 in prison garb. A holographic representation, that is.

"you have to get out. Those three, you think you're the first? Or the last? No, they'll grab more soldiers and bring them here and do what they did to you. Hood, Halsey, Millard, all of them must die. Bust out and kill them all." the hologram said.

"you want me to kill Admiral Hood, Dr. Halsey, and President Millard?" John asked.

"no, you want yourself to kill them, you've been wanting that for a long time now. I have to go now, remember what I said. All of them must die." the hologram then faded away. The screen then turned to black. Everyone was stunned at this revelation.

"that's not possible, that's just not possible." Cortana said slowly.

"he's not the most imaginative person, Cortana. How close are those nukes to hitting us?" Brown asked.

"I don't know. We gotta leave, now." Carter said. Everyone began packing everything up, ready to leave Avalanche. Everyone except the two men in the booth and John-117, they wanted to know one last piece of information.

"chief, we know you know about the numbers, where are they being broadcasted from?" the first man asked.

"I DON'T FUCKING KNOW!" John screamed angrily.

"it's no use, he won't tell us! We're out of time!" the first man growled.

"we can't give up now! He was at Vorkuta, he knows how to translate the codes. He's heard the broadcasts, he can trace them back to it's original location. It's all in his head somewhere. He does know where it is!" the second man replied.

"we've tried everything, those nukes are gonna hit us any second now!"

"not yet, I got one more card to play." the second man replied. The large steel door opened up to reveal Sgt. Johnson, his cigar in his mouth.

"get outta here, Hudson! Tell 'em I failed!"

"you wanna die with this psycho?! Be my guest!" Hudson yelled angrily. Johnson walked to his friend, losing his temper and throwing a monitor to the ground.

"dammit! Why can't you remember what happened to you?! Hudson's right. We're outta time, those three sure did fuck you up." Johnson muttered, taking the chains off his wrists. Once his left arm was free, he grabbed his friend and threw him across the room, knocking him out. Ripping the chains off, he grabbed the fallen Desert Eagle and ran through the hallways of the base. That's when he began hearing the numbers again, making him slow his run and stumble. Grabbing the wall, he heard something behind him. He looked around to see Jason Hudson deliver a nasty punch to him, knocking him down. When he came do, he found a Desert Eagle at his face.

"Hood, Halsey and Millard brainwashed you to kill the 141, but you were smart enough to figure out what was going on and sabotaged it."

"I trusted those three." John sighed, running his hands over his face.

"dammit, I trusted them!" John groaned angrily, Hudson helping him up.

"that's why it worked...It was their attempt at an old MK-Ultra. They programmed you to kill the 141, but you sabotaged their efforts. You wanted revenge on those three because they used you, but you weren't fast enough and the memory locks set in. There are going to be gaps in your memory, periods where you went MIA and we won't be able to account for you. But now that the brain washing's been broken, all that lost time will come back. Those nukes are gonna hit us now, we gotta leave. You're the only person who knows about the numbers, where they're coming from, what they're for. We haven't been able to track them back, but we think you can. We've been broadcasting them, but we haven't broken through. John, please, this is our very last shot. Listen. If not for us, at least for yourself or Cortana, it's no secret how you feel about her. If those nukes fall, she'll die along with us. Please. Listen, just listen, that's all I'm asking." Hudson said, playing the numbers one last time. John buried his head in his arms and listened. Deep in the very recesses of his mind and the numbers, he heard Halsey's voice. He wasn't able to figure out what she was saying, but two words rang out over and over again.

"we've been there before. Everyone person in this base has been to the location. That's where the numbers are being broadcasted from."

"where?"

"Blood Gulch." John sighed.

"Blood Gulch it is, then. Let's go tell everyone else." Hudson said, holstering his gun. In the main room where everyone was settled, including a slightly wounded Avery Johnson,

"I know where the numbers are being broadcasted from. Grif, get out."  
>"why does he need to leave?" Church asked.<p>

"he just does. Get out." John ordered. Once the yellow soldier was gone,

"where are the numbers being broadcasted from?" Cortana asked.

"we're going to Blood Gulch." John said.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" Grif screamed, loud and long.

"music to my ears." Sarge said happily. John wasn't grinning at all.

"why?" Church asked.

"it's where those numbers are being broadcasted from. Trust me, it's there." after a moment of silence,

"so what's the plan?" Nikolai asked, drinking his vodka.

"simple. We go there, destroy the communications equipment, and kill everyone there. I'm betting that Halsey will be there as well. I'm hoping for it, actually."

"why are you hoping Halsey would be there?" Carter asked. John stared at the commander. Only Dr. Brown, Hudson, Johnson and Cortana saw the footage from John's mind.

"it's simple. When I get there, I'm gonna kill Dr. Halsey." John said coldly.

* * *

><p><strong>Hope my readers enjoyed it. If anyone remembers H:BO from the past, this story will now be vastly different, I'll be adding more lemon scenes between certain couples, (JohnxCortana, CarterxKat, etc.) and I'll try and make my battle scenes more detailed. I hope I succeed. Next chapter will be coming soon. Read and review, please!<strong>


	20. Chapter 19

**Next chapter of Halo Black Ops. Sorry it took a while to upload. Spoiler alert, there will be some character death in here. I own nothing. I'm also changing the UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun, her ship class from a UNSC supercarrier to a UNSC mega-supercarrier. Essentially, if you were to line up 5 Infinity-class ships bow to stern in a straight line, that's how long the ship is. Just so you know. Enjoy!**

* * *

><p>Chapter 19<p>

May 4th, 2563

Unidentified ONI/Freelancer Base

Codename [Avalanche]

Unknown Planet

"okay. Let me get this straight. You're gonna take the Task Force back to Blood Gulch and kill Dr. Halsey? The women who turned you into who you are now?" Edward asked.

"pretty much." John shrugged his shoulders.

"any reason why?" Simmons asked. Bad question. John got up and slowly walked over to the smaller soldier. The massive SPARTAN-II absolutely towered over the Red Team Trooper in every possible.

"because the bitch stabbed me in the back and betrayed me. Granted, everyone here did that, but I'm more than willing to give all of you a second chance. Not with her. Does that answer your question? Or shall I beat it in you?" John asked.

"John." Cortana said in a rather commanding voice. If there was anyone that could really control the famed 'Master Chief', it was the women he loved. John backed away from the frightened soldier.

"so, what's the plan?" Carter asked.

"what do you mean?" John replied.

"well, we're going with you. Despite the fact that you've been augmented to kill SPARTAN's very easily, you'll still need our help." Carter said, grabbing his DMR.

"let's just get to Blood Gulch. We'll decide everything out when we get there." John said. The walk to the surface was rather quiet, save for the intermingling sounds of the dull thuds of combat boots, the click-clack of Cortana's stiletto boots, and the sound of rifles and machine guns being locked-and-loaded. When they got to the surface, John removed his helmet and inhaled deeply, the cold air filling his lungs and awakening his senses. Grabbing the headset from inside his helmet,

"captain Keyes, send the pelicans down. And set a course for Blood Gulch immediately. I'd advise we do so at Alert 1. UNSC will be waiting for us." John said rather calmly.

"any reason why? What are you planning on doing there?"

"I'm gonna kill Dr. Halsey. Did you get the data Doc Brown sent?" John asked, simply assuming that his friend had sent the captain a message concerning his recent augments and brainwashing.

"yes, I did. I'll grant your request, but know that there will be consequences to this, consequences that we can't control."

"like what, the UNSC coming after us? They're not a problem." John replied.

"If you wanna believe that, I won't stop you. Just get onboard. Oh, and those nukes? Just a false signature meant to scare us."

"whatever you say, captain." John muttered, knowing full well that the UNSC would be hunting him now. Cortana took his gloved hand in her bare one.

"it's gonna be okay, John, it'll be fine."

"how do you know that? How can you say that? UNSC will be looking for us after this." John replied. Cortana gently pulled him down by his scarred neck and kissed him. The two briefly thought that the snowy environment might've made for a good backdrop for a very romantic setting, if it wasn't for the destroyed Pelican, the destroyed Warthog, the dead bodies and the burn marks from the explosives that John and Tex had used. Not to mention the recent turn of events that had plagued all of them. But when they finished,

"I can say that because I know you, John. You have your mind set on this goal, and you don't let anything stop you from reaching your goals. And believe it or not, I'm gonna help you, because I love you."

"still think I'm crazy?" John smiled.

"you're definitely crazy. That's one of the things I love about you." Cortana replied.

"hey, I hate to interrupt, but our ride's here." Sarge pointed out. Several Pelican dropships came down, blowing snow everywhere when they landed.

"okay, let's do this." John said. He actually carried Cortana in the dropship with her arms wrapped around his neck; that had earned them a few chuckles from several 141 members.

"bow chicka bow wow." Tucker muttered. As John walked onboard the craft, he turned around to survey the damage of the ice canyon. He thought he saw someone out in the distance. _what? No, that can't be..._ John thought as he saw a figure out in the distance.

"something wrong?" Cortana asked, bringing him out of his trance.

"no. no, nothing's wrong." John smiled, trying to put the event behind him.

May 4th, 2563

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

Command Bridge, Deck 1

"okay, we got an accurate reading. Here's Blood Gulch." the captain said, fiddling with the controls on the holo-table. A holographic image of Blood Gulch popped up. It looked vastly different, however. Instead of a totally solid box canyon, it more open. The two bases on opposing sides were still there, but the canyon looked more open, and there was a massive opening on the far end that led into a massive body of water. There were also HMG placements, missile pods, sniper emplacements, self-automated turrets, you name it, the UNSC had it there.

"looks a bit like Valhalla." Simmons remarked.

"yeah, if Valhalla was heavily terraformed into a fucking Hornet's Nest." Woods snarked.

"so what's the battle plan?" Veronica asked.

"simple, we'll dispense our own brand of Red Team justice, and hopefully Grif will die in the process!" Sarge declared.

"oh stop, I'm crying a river of tears." Grif muttered sarcastically.

"both of you shut up. What's the plan, Chief?" Keyes asked.

John stared at the holo-image, his eyes burning with hatred and anger.

_go ahead, John-117. Tell them what your plan is to kill the women who gave us a purpose in life. It's what you want, isn't it? _came the voice of Sam-034. John spotted a SPARTAN in the corner of the bridge. He had his helmet off and a large hole in the middle of his chest that resembled a plasma round had struck the man. John recognized him immediately. Ignoring the hallucination,

"we'll bring the 141 down across the water, below their radar. Ramius, you take the 4th Bombardier Unit and flatten these two airfields..." John pointed to two airfields on the very tops of the canyon, on top of the plateaus. "so they can't get anything in the air. After that, strafe the tops and get rid of any snipers or heavy weapon emplacements they put there. We'll land here at the far end, simply push our way through. Simple enough." John planned out.

"problem with your plan. If Halsey is here, then she might be underground. Just these two bases here is all we see. Definitely not the safest place to hide from an angry SPARTAN." Kat remarked.

"hey Sarge, you said Blood Gulch had a large cavern underneath, right?" Jun asked.

"yup. I discovered it when Command said that I was dead, so I had Grif and Simmons bury me alive, and I fell straight into it." Sarge said almost a little proudly, earning a stare from Keyes.

"he was a very chatty corpse." Grif said.

"sure sounds like it." Emile said.

"wait, you were declared dead?" Keyes asked in disbelief.

"captain, the Simulation Trooper project of Project Freelancer was... is staffed by very low-level operatives from the UNSC Military." Washington said.

"hey, I don't appreciate being called low-level operative. Just because I didn't finish the tests on time, doesn't mean I'm low-level." Simmons remarked.

"well, we all know you don't work well under pressure." Grif replied.

"I'd agree with you on that, Grif. But to do so would make me question all my beliefs, on what a lazy, horrible, dirt-bag you are. So I will simply grunt." Sarge replied, grunting in the process.

"okay then. In any case, your mission is approved, Chief. Bring her back alive, that's an order." Keyes stated. He was still trying to get used to the Reds and Blues, they were just... different. Why they were in the UNSC in the first place just baffled him. John simply stared at his superior officer.

"you deaf soldier? that's an order."

"then that's an order I that I can't follow, captain."

* * *

><p>May 4th, 2563<p>

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

Deck 5

John was alone in the bathroom, thank goodness for that. Cortana was busy talking with Captain Keyes and Commander Carter, going over the final details of their attack. Granted, John had made it up completely on a whim, but he didn't care. He wanted her dead, no doubt about that. _I will kill that bitch. I will kill Catherine Halsey_ John thought. He looked up in the mirror, his hands lightly gripping the counter. His hair had grown out some, and his facial hair had become more noticeable. Not massive, but it was definitely there. _Doc Brown was right, I do look like Russell Crowe, if he was a war-torn, pissed off SPARTAN-II _John thought darkly to himself. He noticed that the Element 115 had definitely kept him looking young, despite all the alcohol and cigarettes he had consumed over his lifetime. "what do you want?" John asked. Sam had come back, he was currently leaning against the bathroom wall.

"just wanted to talk, see how my friend is doing. Now, before you say anything, I know that I'm dead. I know that I'm just a figment of your brain expressing itself." the hallucination started.

"you're dead. Remember? Stayed behind to defend that nuke and blew that Covenant ship to pieces. Vaporized. I know you're not here." John defended himself.

"are you really gonna do it?" John thought about it for a moment. Was he really having a conversation with his dead comrade, his dead friend?

"yes, I am. And I'll kill anyone who gets in my way, SPARTAN or not." John said fiercely.

"so how are the new augments treating you?" Sam pointed out. John rubbed his arms, unconsciously rubbing the number that was imprinted on his left arm when he arrived at Vorkuta. _117-CTN042-9_

"I'll get used to them." John sighed, still trying to wrap his mind around the fact that he had been so... so used like that. John looked up and saw Sam was gone. He shut his eyes and desperately tried to force the horrible memories of that hell-hole out of his mind, but couldn't. He simply couldn't. He quickly opened the drawer and pulled out a bottle of 2532 Smirnoff Vodka. He hated, absolutely _hated_ the fact that he was an alcoholic, but the taste of that burning poison running down his throat, what it did to his already fucked-up mind, that was so hard to get rid of... tears streamed down his face as he pressed the bottle to his lips-

"John, are you okay?" came Cortana's voice from the room. Only one gulp went down his throat before he put the bottle down. The door silently hissed open. John turned around, leaning against the counter. It slightly strained against his weight, but John figured when the ship was rebuilt, Doc Brown and Richtofen redesigned the 'Task Force 141' hallway, as it had came to be know, to fit each individual member. Of course, they didn't know about his additional augments back then. Right now, John looked into Cortana's eyes, her bright blue eyes. He honestly felt ashamed that she saw him like this.

"John, you don't need to feel ashamed about anything." she tried to console him.

"I should, I'm better than this. At least I should be. Cortana, why do you love me?" John asked suddenly. She was rather surprised by that question. "I'm serious, why do you love, such a messed up, alcoholic SPARTAN like me?" his voice sounded very tired, almost to the point of tears.

"John, I grew to love you on my own. It took me a while to figure it out, but I realized that I loved you when you rescued me from High Charity. The first time. You see... the Gravemind... when he tortured me... he just fed me lie after lie, saying that you were never gonna come back, that you didn't care about me. I kept convincing myself that he was wrong, that you were gonna come back. And you did." Cortana said softly. She was slowly walking to him, her stiletto's echoing on the steel floor. She slowly slid her hands up his muscular torso and up his scarred back. "and when you assembled the 141, how I saw you fight for each of them, I realized that you would do just about anything for the people you care about. And when you came back to High Charity the second time..." Cortana continued. They both remembered that very well. Dempsey, Nikolai, Takeo and Richtofen had practically shot the Flood-turned High Charity to pieces. Not to mention all the empty Vodka bottles had definitely made for some good CQB weapons. "when I fell in love with you, I made the decision to be with you for as long as I lived. When Emmett made me metastable, I was ready to be with you forever. Secretly, I was hoping that he would've made me human, but I think we both know how that all turned out." John smiled at that. If Cortana was made human all those years ago, then the 141 might not have survived this long. She had helped keep all of them alive for so long; they all owed a debt to her, one that could never be repaid.

"I love you, Cortana." John said simply. He ran his callous hands up her torso, gently bringing her closer to him. Their lips met again, but with more passion then back at Avalanche. Cortana slid her smooth hands in his shirt, rubbing his scarred and muscular body, before slowly going to his belt.

She undid his belt and pants, slipping her hands into his boxers. John moaned softly at her soft hands gently stroking his 14-inch long manhood. "wanna take this to the bed?" she asked seductively. John simply picked her up and gently laid her down on the large bed, his lips now latched to her neck. Within moments, the two lovers were naked, their clothes in a bundle on the floor. A throaty moan emanating from Cortana as John continued his ministrations. His left hand slowly caressed down her stomach to between her legs; Cortana's breathing got faster. While he starting finger-banging her, his right arm pinned Cortana's arms on the bed above her head. John moved his lips down to those massive orbs on her chest, his hot breath making her writhe beneath him. He moved down and began sucking her erect nipples, sending more waves of pleasure through her body. _where the hell did he learn all this?_ Cortana thought as she moaned loudly. The rooms weren't very soundproof, which everyone found out the hard way with Carter and Kat. John and Cortana didn't care, however. When John moved to her left breast, Cortana felt a tightening in her lower region. John could feel it as well and moved his fingers faster, bringing out her first orgasm.

Kissing his way down her stomach, he reached to between her legs and began his oral stipulation. His arms weren't long enough to keep her arms pinned down, so he just rested them beside her body. Cortana was moaning and sighing, John's actions caused her to experience another orgasm. After licking up her tasty juices, he got to his knees and pulled off his boxers.

"are you ready? It's gonna hurt." John said softly.

"I'm ready." Cortana sighed happily. John knelt down and stuck his erection right in the beginning of her entrance, making Cortana moan again. He slowly pushed downward, making her wince. John stopped.

"you alright?" he whispered.

"I'm fine, just keep going." she whimpered. John kept on pushing in, deeper and deeper until he was all the way inside, down to her hilt. He stopped for a moment to revel in the pleasure he was feeling. He began thrusting in and out again, making Cortana wince with pain. John thought she had a lot of strength not to cry out in pain. After more thrusting, the wincing stopped and the moaning began. Loudly. A little dissatisfied, between moans, Cortana told John to go faster and harder, which he immediately complied with. The pleasure she was feeling was amazing, she never thought she'd ever feel like this. But here she was, human, making love with the man she loved. During their lovemaking, in the briefest of moments of control, they thought it was a little ironic that John was now making love to Cortana, in a clone of Dr. Halsey's body, the night before John was gonna go down and kill her. But they put that aside as they continued.

After a moment, the tightening in Cortana's lower regions came back. She cried out his name as she rode another orgasm. But because of his superhuman stamina and his augments, John didn't feel the same, not yet at least. So when Cortana should've relaxed, she found herself being probed by his erection. John and Cortana didn't know what time it was, and they didn't care. For now, it was just them, the whole universe to themselves. After about 2 and a half hours of lovemaking, Cortana had her 3rd orgasm, screaming out John's name. However, she wasn't alone. John felt her walls tighten up and felt something in his genitals. Thrusting harder and faster, he plunged in one last time as he felt himself shoot his load into the woman he loved, calling out her name. Devoid of energy, he collapsed on the bed beside her staring into her blue eyes.

"I love you, Cortana."

"I love you, John."

John reached down and pulled the blankets over their naked, sweaty bodies, the two of them falling into a blissful sleep.

* * *

><p>May 5th, 2563<p>

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

Deck 5

The flickering lights woke up the two lovers, the larger one silently cursing at the lights.

"Morning, John." Cortana said almost sleepily, a smile on her face.

"sleep good last night?" John asked.

"no thanks to your humping." she replied, making the SPARTAN chuckle.

"you did amazing last night, you know?" Cortana asked as they moved into a much more comfortable position, her lying on his bare chest.

"you could say I have a very active imagination. Lot of wet dreams. Of course, you would know of all that." John smirked.

"you're right, I do know of it all." the two simply lay there, holding each other. They both knew of their upcoming mission, but didn't want it to happen. Not yet anyway, at least for John.

"what's gonna happen after this mission?" Cortana asked.

"I honestly don't know. When word of the attack gets out, the UNSC will more than likely brand everyone onboard as fugitives and put a kill/capture order on all of us." John said rather plainly. Cortana shivered at that, despite the heavy blanket and the SPARTAN's body warmth. "you shouldn't worry. I'm not gonna let anything happen to you."

"do you mean that, John?"

planting a soft kiss on her lips, "with all my heart."

* * *

><p>May 5th, 2563<p>

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

Deck5

"don't stop, Carter, please... don't stop." Kat pleaded very lustfully as her husband pumped himself in her, again and again. Carter moaned as he felt Kat's bare body rub against his, the shower water providing lubricant. Kat had her legs spread apart and her hands pressed to the shower wall, although she leaned her head back on Carter's chest. Carter had his calloused hands wrapped around his wife's torso, cupping her large double-D size breasts. He slammed his 13-inch organ deep into Kat's womanhood, her butt cheeks jiggling every time he went in. The two SPARTAN's, husband and wife, soon climaxed.

"I love you, Catherine." Carter sighed, kissing her neck.

"hey Carter?"

"yeah, babe?"

"when this mission is over, can you send in our papers to have us removed from the unit?"

"I already gave them to the captain last night. He say's he's gonna disband the entire Task Force." Kat turned around and held her husband tightly. After a moment,

"what do you think John's gonna say? if he ever finds out?"

"about the unit? or about you?"

"both."

"well, I think he's tired of fighting. And if he ever does find out about you being pregnant... he'll respect that and let us leave. Besides, I think he wants to leave also, maybe more so than anyone of us." Carter said, getting on his knees and pressing his forehead to Kat's stomach. Kat held the back of his head, gently playing with his hair. As long as he had Kat, that was everything he could ask for.

Kat had gotten pregnant about six months ago, but the Element 115 in her body had greatly slowed the growth of their child, so she looked more like she was only 2 weeks along. It also greatly hindered her morning sickness; she didn't have any. Not yet, however. The fact that her pregnancy was greatly slowed down had enabled the two to stay in the military a while longer. They both greatly resented that fact, but did their duty as SPARTAN's nonetheless.

"after all this... it's just gonna be you, me, and our daughter. And that's all I could ever ask for." Carter said. He had no idea just what a bitch Murphy's Law could be.

* * *

><p>May 5th, 2563<p>

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

Hanger Deck 1A

(several hours later...)

John and Cortana walked inside the hanger deck, taking in their surroundings. The 141 Huey gunships stood out, being the largest vehicles on the massive deck. John also surveyed the 4th Bombadier Unit that Captain Marco 'Nikolai' Ramius would be leading. He had 45 Longswords, 55 Sabres, 24 Broadswords, 32 Shortswords, 55 Hornet gunships, and 15 Sparrowhawk gunships. They all had the 'Nikolai Treatment', meaning they were heavily augmented to carry more weapons; more rocket pods, more missile pods, extra cannon and machine gun pods. Their engines were also augmented to help the craft carry the extra weight. John hoped they had some form of energy shielding; any stray shot would turn one of those ships into a large fireball. While he was surveying the ships, all of the personal on the deck took second glances at the two, especially Cortana. She was wearing a very form-fitting ODST armor that clung to her attractive body very well, the Task Force 141 version of the ODST/UA Personal Protective Equipment. Essentially, the ODST armor that the 141's 'Helljumpers' had wore for the past 40 years. She was also armed with an M739 SAW with a grenade launcher attacked to the bottom. She had two bandoliers of HE grenades and very large shotgun shells she could use in the launcher should her Desert Eagle or combat knife not be available. For some odd reason, she slapped on an EVOS-D scope on the top, albeit on a swivel she could move to the side.

"I like that look." Carter commented.

"back off, she's with me." John said very jokingly.

"good to have you back, chief." the veteran SPARTAN-III replied.

"good to be back." John said, checking his armaments. He had the standard MA5D/I rifle Doc Brown had armed him with when he arrived back at the ship, along with two Desert Eagles, two M7 SMG's, a large assortment of Makarov's frag grenades, (which had earned a reputation as being a true meat-shredder), several combat knives, loads of ammunition clips, and what appeared to be more modern version of a Panzerfaust slapped on his back with two rockets.

"think that's enough, chief?" Shepherd asked, flicking the safety off on his MA5D. John did a double take when he saw his rifle. In fact, the entire Task Force 141, aside from Dr. Richtofen, was armed now armed with modern UNSC weaponry.

"so what's with the change of weaponry?" Cortana asked, taking her seat on the lead Huey gunship.

"that battle with the Meta; kinda told us we needed to upgrade our weapons to more modern stuff. We don't have the time or resources to keep making ammo for our old artillery. Not to mention, whatever we see down there, will more than likely be armed with these." Dempsey said, tapping his M739. He meant modern UNSC weapons, not his SAW specifically. John understood why. Using weapons that your enemy held would mean a very large depot of ammunition. Dr. Richtofen, however, still used his MP-40, although he still had his reasons.

"Master Chief, is your team ready?" Captain Keyes asked.

"yes sir. We're ready." John said, surveying his unit.

"alright. Be advised, this is the lowest that I can drop you, any lower, and I'll show up on their scanners. She's not a small ship, John, you know that. If you need anything, go ahead and call."

"thank you, Captain, but... I think I got all the help I need down here on the hanger."

"okay, Chief. I'll see you on the other side. Good Luck." the captain said. A klaxon horn sounded and a red light began flashing; the mission was a-go.

"everyone on the gunships, now!" John barked. The hum of the rotors mingled with the roars of the engines of the Bombadier unit.

"Nikolai, you good?" John asked.

"ready."

"give 'em hell."

* * *

><p>May 5th, 2563<p>

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

Command Deck, Bridge

Captain Jacob Keyes looked out the main window as he saw the Task Force 141 and the 4th Bombadier Unit head down to the planet surface. He had no idea what would happen after this. Nevertheless, he ordered the entire ship to be at battle stations should anyone try to stop them. He hoped no UNSC forces would be at the planet-

"captain, UNSC ships coming in range!" Lt. Hikowa yelled.

"who are they?" Keyes ordered. He looked at the holo-table and soon saw: It was Battle Group: PREDATOR. He knew rather well; Captain Cutter was in command of that group, although he had been promoted to the rank of Rear Admiral shortly after he returned to Earth. He kept his command of the _UNSC Spirit of Fire_, although that ship was heavily refitted to fit modern specs. The battlegroup had one _Phoenix_-class colony ship, 5 _Paris_-class heavy frigates, 5 _Strident_-class heavy frigates, 8 _Autumn_-class heavy cruisers, and 2 _Vindication_-class battleships. Keyes knew they weren't a match for the Morning Sun, but they could still pack a punch. He was just glad his daughter wasn't in that group. That made his mind a little easier on his next decision, but not a lot.

"captain, we're being hailed." Lt. Dominique interrupted Jacob's trance.

"let's see it." he looked down at the holo-table. A holo-image of Rear Admiral Cutter appeared.

"James, how ya doin?"

"cut the formalities, Captain. We both know why you're here."

"did that bitch Halsey contact you? Ask for help? You and I both know you won't survive against me. I don't want to have to do this, but I will shoot your ships outta the sky if I have to, to let the Master Chief complete his mission." Jacob should've been surprised that those words came out, but he wasn't. The bridge crew was, however. The Rear Admiral was surprised as well, that was a very real death threat.

"I have my orders, captain-" Jacob cut the transmission out. Walking away from the table,

"gimme a firing solution on all their ships. And let's show them their main guns can't hurt us, activate the anti-MAC system." Jacob said, wondering if those would be his last words.

"yes sir." Hikowa said slowly.

"and jam all their comms. Choke them out." Keyes said quickly.

May 5th, 2563

UNSC Spirit of Fire

Command Bridge

"Serina, gimme a targeting solution on the _Morning Sun._" Cutter said solemnly.

"are we really going to fire on another UNSC ship, sir?" the snarky A.I. asked.

"Jacob Keyes made his choice. If we let him loose now, especially with that ship, who knows what else he'll do. We need to stop him now. Do we have a solution?"  
>"yes sir."<p>

"then fire."

The _Spirit of Fire_ fired off three nuclear MAC rounds from her main gun. All three screamed towards the larger target at speeds up to 45,000 meters per second. The I-85 Anti-MAC system, however, was already up and running. The heavily modified 'Dumb' A.I. charged with running that system immediately detected the three rounds heading towards them. Around 87 domes lit up, glowing a strange white. The three rounds suddenly burst into flames before they got close to the _Morning Sun_, her heavy shielding protecting the ship from the blast. The rest of the battle group immediately opened fire, but their MAC rounds met the same fate.

"my turn." Captain Keyes smiled. He didn't even fire his main cannon, he simply sped up and put his ship right in the middle of the battlegroup. Once he was inside, however, he unleashed hell on the pathetically smaller force.

* * *

><p>May 5th, 2563<p>

Blue Base

Blood Gulch

"shit, this didn't go to plan!" Grif yelled.

"nonsense, of course it went to plan!" John laughed as he fired off several rounds. Grif, however, was right. The plan was that the Huey gunships fly underneath the radar, hoping that they could sneak in. However, UNSC ODST Scuba Divers had spotted the gunships from underneath the water and warned the Blood Gulch defenders. Although no-one was shot down, they were in a rather large fire-fight. Sarge, however, was greatly enjoying it.

"I knew this would be a good mission!" he yelled. No one else shared his enthusiasm. The UNSC ODST's charged with defending Blood Gulch had done their job well. The fact that they were able to hold off the SPARTAN's alone was a testament to their prowess, as well as the fact that the 141 had greatly lost a lot of their training as UNSC soldiers. But then again, they had all stopped being soldiers a long time ago.

"I want fire suppression on that ridge up there! Captain Dare, take your squad and start looking through this base, find anything that we can use to our advantage! Cortana, go with them, hack their gun emplacements!" John yelled. Firing off another HE grenade, Cortana ran. She jumped and dove through a shot-up window, shattering it to pieces. Once she landed, she quickly turned on her back and aimed her Desert Eagle at the window, breathing heavily. After a moment...

"I swear the Chief's luck must've rubbed off on you!" Dutch yelled as he crawled through the window. Cortana simply sighed in relief as she removed her helmet.

"watch my back, I'm gonna try and use their weapons on them." Cortana said, quickly typing in several commands on the console. She spotted something on the window. Very quickly, she grabbed her knife, and in one very swift motion, turned around, got on one knee and threw the knife very expertly into a cloaked ODST's neck. He fell to the ground, gurgling on his blood.

"I said watch my back!" Cortana snapped.

"uh, yeah, we'll do that." Buck said, clearly in shock of what just happened.

"what are you doing?" Mickey asked, firing off a rocket through the window.

"this." Cortana said, pressing one last button on the console. All the automated weapon emplacements suddenly turned and began firing on the Blood Gulch defenders.

"Chief, I got their own weapons against them, that should make our job easier." Cortana said.

"perfect, we're moving up. Nikolai, give us some air cover, we're moving up." John ordered.

"move up!" Woods yelled, firing his assault rifle.

"wonder what the captain's doing?" Mason asked his friend.

"I have no idea, Alex. Sure as hell wish he would help us out down here." Reznov replied, slamming another clip into his M7.

* * *

><p>May 5th, 2563<p>

UNSC Spirit of Fire

(three hours later...)

"Serina, alert the crew to abandon ship! And keep our weapons firing, we need to cover the escape pods!" Cutter ordered, holding a large gauze bandage to his left shoulder. He quickly surveyed the wreckage of his bridge; he was actually the only one left alive, aside from Serina, who was distracted at the moment.

Everyone else had died during the battle, which wasn't much of a battle. His ship never stood a chance. "Serina!"

"on it, captain. I'd suggest you get to the shuttlecraft, I can take it from here."

"it's been an honor, Serina." Cutter said. He took one last look at his destroyed bridge, then turned around and headed down the exploding halls of his ship as fast as he could.

The left wall rather violently opened up. Darkness was the last thing that Captain James Cutter ever saw.

May 5th, 2563

UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun

Jacob Keyes and the bridge crew of the mega-supercarrier watched as missile after missile pummeled the helpless ship. Massive gaping holes appeared in her hull with each strike, sending dozens of UNSC personal to a freezing, instantaneous death. The _Spirit of Fire _suddenly erupted in a massive ball of flame, cracking the old warship in half.

"send this to the UNSC. Let them know that I can't be beat. If anyone tries to stop me... this is what I'll do to them." Keyes said coldly.

"sir, we're seeing a Pelican dropship heading towards the planet. Going straight to Blood Gulch." Hikowa reported.

"our unit can take care of them."

* * *

><p>May 5th, 2563<p>

Red Base

Blood Gulch

(two hours later...)

"SUCK MY BALLS, COCKSUCKER!" Tucker screamed as he slammed a grenade through a glass window. He ducked as shards of glass and metal blew out. He and Pvt. Miller ran inside, firing their battle rifles, taking out any enemy combatant they saw.

"shit, behind you!" Miller yelled, side-swiping a cloaked ODST with is left leg, sending him to the ground. "STAB!" Tucker yelled, impaling the last defender of Blood Gulch. The roar of a Warthog drew their attention. Kennedy, Castro, Nixon, and McNamara had fired up the vehicle.

"where are you going?" Tucker yelled.

"we missed a sniper's nest back there, we're gonna clear it out!" Kennedy yelled from the driver's seat. The Warthog tore across the canyon, Castro firing the chain gun-

"NO!" Thel 'Vadam yelled as the Warthog suddenly erupted in a ball of flame. A badly damaged Pelican slowly flew into Blood Gulch, fire erupting from her engines. No one needed a college degree to know it was the gunship that destroyed the Warthog and sent it's four passengers to a violent, fiery death. The Pelican's engines suddenly conked out, and the craft slammed on the ground. Immediately, it was peppered with machinegun bullets and shotgun shells. After about two hours of shooting, the 141 surrounded the destroyed craft, just waiting to see if anyone had survived.

"John, you got any rockets left?" Makarov asked.

"nope. Only brought two, and I used them on that Scorpion tank back in the middle of the canyon. Sure as hell wish Nikolai left a few birds behind, instead of taking them back to get refilled." Sierra-117 grumbled.

"alright, clear it out. Let's see who's in here." MacTavish ordered. Team NOBLE crawled inside to eliminate anyone inside.

"man, can't believe we actually shot down a Pelican." Simmons said.

"that's because we didn't, it crashed here, remember? Engines are all shot to shit." Grif shot down fellow team-mate.

"so, that doesn't mean we can't claim credit!"

"shut up, both of you." Doc Brown snapped. A while later, Noble came out.

"nothing but a bunch of dead SPARTAN-III's. From the looks of it, the last ones from Onyx. That means Noble are the only SPARTAN-III's left." Carter muttered. As everyone stomached those news, everyone noticed the silence was incredibly deafening, as well as the stench of spent gunpowder, freshly spilt blood, human feces, and burning flesh.

"did we do it?" Cortana asked almost in disbelief.

"yeah. We did. Captain Keyes, we have Blood Gulch secure. I repeat we have-GET TO COVER!" John screamed as large mortars began falling into the canyon. An awesome display of firepower suddenly racked the canyon.

"GET TO COVER! FIND A HOLE, GET IN THE BASES, STAY HIDDEN!" John yelled. He had actually grabbed Cortana and ran into a large hole in the far wall. She was lucky, she hardly got a scratch on her. Others weren't so lucky.

"come on! COME ON, GET INSIDE!" Dutch screamed hoarsely at the two SPARTAN's.

"Carter, remind me after this is over to have a chat with the Doc about-" Kat never got to finish her sentence as a mortar landed dangerously close to her, which sent her flying. Carter immediately picked her up and booked it to the base, not caring if he got struck or not.

"I'm sorry, God, I'm so sorry, Catherine." Carter kept apologizing as he gently laid his wife on the ground. Removing their helmets, they were both horrified at what they saw: the mortar round had somehow blasted off Kat's abdomen section of her armor, sending shrapnel which absolutely carved up her stomach and parts of her uterus. Carter slammed his eyes shut, failing to hold back the tears. With trembling hands he put them on the back of his head and suddenly screamed.

* * *

><p>May 5th, 2563<p>

Blood Gulch

Sniper's Nest A-1

"come on, get inside!" Washington yelled as Tucker and Caboose sprinted inside, mortar rounds peppering the walls.

"I'm scared, this place is scary!" Caboose yelled, not knowing that he had a bullet in his left thigh.

"dammit Wash, what the hell went wrong?" Tucker asked, collapsing on the ground.

"I don't know, someone's bombing us! Nikolai, this is Agent Washington, we need you to find where those mortars are coming from, they got the whole canyon zero'd in!"

"copy that, we're coming down now." the Russian replied. Five Sabre jets roared across the skies, firing off napalm-flak missiles. The mortars suddenly stopped.

"you got 'em, the mortars have stopped. We need a medi-Pelican right now, we got wounded."

"roger that, sending it down now." a heavily armed Pelican flew down into the canyon.

"Caboose, go with them, get your leg checked out."

"okay. I didn't know I was shot."

"that's the adrenaline."

"oh. yeah, I don't know what that last word is, so I'll just accept it. my leg hurts."

"I know. Just get onboard."

Caboose limped over to the craft, watching the wounded walk onboard. Dempsey had a bad burn on his left ribcage from a napalm mortar; Kat was being carried inside by her husband, both of whom were greatly wounded both physically and mentally; Foley and Ramirez had pieces of steel sticking out of their legs; Mickey and Romeo had to be carried onboard because of shrapnel shredding up their lower spinal cords. Four bodies were carried onboard wrapped up in white sheets taken from the Red Team/Blue Team bases. Everyone knew who had died. It was a rather somber moment, especially for John. For the first time, he realized that his squad could be beaten. They were an incredibly tough nut to crack, but they could still be beaten. _Were we ever this mortal? We've never been beaten like this._ John thought to. He noticed the Pelican fly away with it's wounded cargo from inside Red Base.

"Cortana, Doc, you two are with me. Sarge, Simmons, Grif, you three as well. You three know the caverns better than any of us, we'll need your help."

"okay. They've probably rebuilt it, just so you know." Sarge commented.

"we'll make it work. Everyone else, you make sure no-one comes after us." John ordered as he opened up the hatch on the basement of Red Base.

"alright. Let's do this." John muttered.

* * *

><p><strong>So, the reason some members of the TF-141 died; I thought long and hard about those four characters. I only wrote them into my story because I was rather obsessed with Call of Duty Black Ops when I started to write this story, more specifically the zombie maps. I decided to kill them off because I didn't really want them anymore. Also, with the death of Carter and Kat's unborn child, I put that in there to try and make the story more human. Don't know how that went. The next chapter should focus more on the mental hell everyone is going through after this battle and what it will mean to all of them.<strong>

**Also, next chapter will start the inclusion of Red vs Blue Season 10, characters and story plots. Wish me luck!**


	21. Chapter 20

**So sorry for those waiting for the next chapter of Halo: Black Ops. Just so everyone knows, this is the last chapter of this story. I'm ending this story because I don't know if I can keep expanding it. I've tried several different plots to add on, but none of it seemed to really fit. So I've decided to simply finish this story and write a sequel to it instead. Thanks to all the reviews, all those who have favorited and followed my story. Enjoy!**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing.**

* * *

><p>Chapter 20<p>

May 5th, 2563

Blood Gulch

Underground Caverns

"man, look at this place! Damn thing's massive!" Grif yelled, his voice echoing. And it alerted the defenders to the intruder's presence.

"nice job, dirt-bag." Cortana muttered as UNSC Marines ran to their presence. Bullets started flying in their general direction. Obviously, John went first to provide the best protection. That, and he was the best shot out of them all.

"Grif, fire your weapon!" Brown yelled.

"Simmons, hit their bullets! Grif, I need to use your hideous faced as a shield!" Sarge declared. John walked forward, his assault rifle blasting away at whatever he saw. As the small strike force moved across the catwalk, they took notice of their environment. The caverns were definitely rebuilt to suit the purposes of an underground bunker. That being said, there were a lot of automated weaponry sticking out of the walls. Cortana had hacked into them on the surface, however, so they weren't a problem. Within minutes, the Marines that had been sent to stop them were dead.

"wow, I am glad we made you human. Makes our job a lot easier. Well, time to catch up on my zzzzz's." Grif said.

"not yet, we need to find Halsey. I'm getting the feeling Adm. Hood might be here also, Halsey doesn't have this kind of pull to grab this kind of manpower." John concluded as he ran down the catwalk, the small strike team following him.

"aw man, more work." Grif sighed. The small strike team ran down the catwalk, eventually making their way to a large hallway. Unfortunately, it was filled with doors.

"shit. we'll have to check them all. Get searching!" John barked, kicking down the first door. He slapped his rifle on his back and pulled out his SMG's. _They're better suited for this, anyway_ he thought. Door after door revealed nothing. John's heart began pumping fast, he _had _to find her, just _had_ to, or else...

He busted down the last door. It led to a very large hallway, with 25 levels. All of them had multiple rows of doors. John knew it would be a waste to search them all.

"HOW BIG IS THIS PLACE?!" Grif screamed.

"must've taken the UNSC months to build this place." John muttered.

"we're not gonna find her, not like this. Best thing to do now... return to the ship and nuke the hell outta it." Cortana said softly. John knew she was right.

"okay. We'll leave." John said, determined to find her.

"I'm afraid I can't let you do that." a voice came from behind. As one, John, Cortana, Doc Brown, Sarge, Simmons and Grif turned around and poured everything they had in their frontal direction.

"aw crap, we just gunned down the Fleet Admiral." Doc Brown and Grif muttered. Indeed, it was Admiral Hood they had just viciously gunned down, all shot to pieces.

"doesn't matter. That only leaves me two to go." John said, a grin on his face with a very evil look in his eyes with a very sadistic, almost evil sounding chuckle emanating from his lips.

* * *

><p>May 5th, 2563<p>

Blood Gulch

(30 min later)

The small strike force crawled out of Red Base, tired and worn out.

"find Halsey?" Jorge asked.

"new plan. We're leaving Blood Gulch and we're gonna nuke it from orbit."

* * *

><p>May 5th, 2563<p>

_UNSC Rise of the Morning Sun_

(35 minutes later)

"nukes are prepped, Captain. They're ready to launch on your command." Lt. Hikowa announced.

"thank you, Lt." Jacob said. He inserted his 'Launch Key' and typed in his command code. Almost immediately, 7 HAVOC nuclear payloads left the mega-supercarrier and slammed into Blood Gulch, destroying everything they touched. _goodbye, Catherine_ Jacob thought darkly to himself.

"take us out. Away from any UNSC ships and outposts."

"sir?" Hikowa asked.

"we are leaving the UNSC, am I clear, el-tee?" Jacob said in a very no-nonsense tone. No one dared object to him.

"that's what I thought. Take us out. Anywhere but here."

The massive mega-supercarrier opened up a slipspace wormhole and entered in, away from the destroyed canyon, away from the UNSC... away from their old lives.

* * *

><p>May 7th, 2563<p>

UNSC FLEETCOM HQ

Reach

Epsilon Eridani System

Rear Admiral Tom Lasky sighed deeply as he headed down the steel hallways of FLEETCOM Head-Quarters. Being one of the many Rear Admirals of the UNSC Navy had it's perks, not the least which being the commanding officer of not only the _UNSC Infinity_, but also the only _Infinity_-battlegroup in the entire fleet. _All 15 of the Infinity-class vessels and their escorts packed into one battlegroup. Makes for one helluva threat, damn Innies found that out the hard way back at Arctus-III _he thought to himself. The large steel doors slowly slid open as he arrived at his destination, him being the last person in. The UNSC Admiralty Corps were settled down on a large circular table with a holo-projector build in the middle, with several SPARTAN-IV's standing guard around the room. Tom recognized the leader instantly. _Why, hello to you as well, Sarah _he thought as he sat down. The UNSC Admiralty Corps consisted of him, Fleet Admiral John B. Goodman, Rear Admiral Kyle C. Ryerson, Rear Admiral Jennifer A. Holiday, Admiral Lindsey Bonnerson, and Admiral Sarah Osman. It's purpose was to have the top Admirals in the UNSC Navy bunched together, where they could discuss the best decisions concerning the protection and defense of all UNSC-controlled space. Theoretically, since they were the top commanders, they were probably the best military minds in the fleet, aside from perhaps the SPARTAN's. Admiral Osman stood up.

"thank you all for coming, especially on such short notice. I'm going to cut to the chase on this. Two days ago, one of our Prowlers discovered several nuclear signatures going off in the Archea Star System. As all of you know, Fleet Admiral Terrance Hood and Rear Admiral James Cutter were assigned there to oversee the establishment of a military outpost at this system. What they discovered... was this." the holo-projector glowed as the lights dimmed. The image showed debris floating around the planet, as well as the destroyed remains of the _Spirit of Fire_ and the remains of Blood Gulch.

"we were able to examine the _Spirit_'s black-box... what was left of it, anyway. The mega-supercarrier, _Rise of the Morning Sun_, was behind this attack. We have reason to believe that Captain Jacob Keyes led this attack." murmurs swept across the room. Everyone knew who he was, if not personally, then professionally.

"as of this moment, I have declared the _Rise of the Morning Sun_ to be rogue vessel, as well as her captain and crew. The entire fleet is now being notified. Admiral Lasky, I'm giving this assignment to you. You're probably the most qualified to find him, as well as taking down that ship also."

"I understand, Admiral." Lasky replied, still wondering why the famed Jacob Keyes suddenly went rogue.

"Admiral Lasky, further details concerning the ship and the crew have been sent to your quarters immediately, so you know what you and your battlegroup will be going up against. Everyone is dismissed."

* * *

><p>May 7th, 2563<p>

_UNSC Infinity_

Infinity Battlegroup

Reach

Epsilon Eridani System

The bridge of the _UNSC Infinity_ was busy as usual, with the crew going about performing their assigned tasks to keep one of the most powerful vessels in humanity's arsenal running perfectly. Three individuals were crowded around the main holo-table. Make that two individuals and one A.I. On the table was an image of the rogue ship, the _Rise of the Morning Sun_; the ship Lasky's battlegroup had been tasked to hunt down.

"the sheer size of this ship alone should've made ONI suspicious. I mean, where the hell did they get the money to construct this?" Palmer asked.

"must've been private contractors, PMC's maybe. I just can't believe all the armaments and weapons packed onto this ship... Roland, what exactly are we seeing here? What the hell is this ship?" Lasky asked.

"in a nutshell... the _Infinity _on MAJOR steroids, Admiral. 5 times the length, 8 times the width, and 6 times the height, she's a very large target. And a very strong one too. She's capable of taking punishment that no other ship could dream of."

"that doesn't help me." Lasky sighed. "what would happen if we got into a shoot-out with that ship?"

"we'd lose, hands down."

"you sure about that?" Palmer asked.

"I have been running hundreds of different simulations that I could think of where our battlegroup got into a shooting match with the _Morning Sun_. There is no situation where we could win. Their shields are just too strong, their hull and armor is too durable, and they have an overwhelming amount of weapons that are more than capable of turning _Infinity_ into Swiss cheese."

"what if we struck from afar? Used the MAC cannons?" Lasky asked. Roland sighed as he adjusted the image. "you see these large domes? They emit a very powerful laser beam, one that the human eye, SPARTAN also, can't see. They have over 100 of them onboard."

"what is the purpose for such a weapon?" Lasky asked, getting tired and irritated.

"to swat MAC rounds out of the sky. Used it against the MAC rounds fired from Cutter's convoy. And they're fast, really fast. We could have that ship surrounded and have our main guns firing, and 95% of the time, our rounds will be destroyed before they touch the ship."

"but the other 5 percent?" Palmer asked, a little intrigued.

"might get through, but the flak-cannon system they have can handle what's left. But even if they didn't have that, the engines on _Morning Sun_ are incredibly powerful also. Despite her size, she's fast, faster then any ship in the fleet. With Captain Keyes at the helm, he'll probably pull off another 'Keyes Maneuver' on us. And he'll win, he knows that."

"so MAC cannons are out of the question. And we can't get up close, his guns will chew us to pieces."

"not to mention his stealth systems give him the ability to sneak into any heavily fortified system in the galaxy, do some damage, and sneak out without anyone following him."

"so you're telling us that despite everything we have at our disposal, we can't bring this ship down?" Palmer asked.

"nope."

_Then we are truly fucked_ Lasky thought to himself. "take us to their last known location. We'll start our search from there." he ordered.

"aye, captain." the A.I. responded.

* * *

><p>May 7th, 2563<p>

[Classified ONI Installation]

"I trust you understand the severity of your mission. And I want this done at any costs."

"Yes ma'am… ma'am, he is-"

"One of your own, yes, I understand. That doesn't change the fact that he's gone AWOL. Keep this to yourself. You do understand what this could mean if this information gets out?"

"I do, ma'am."

"Good. Take the prowler and head out." Osman said somewhat quickly.

(A few minutes later…..)

Hanger Bay 14-C

"Does everyone understand our mission?" Fred asked.

"Yes. Are we really going after our own brother? After everything he's done for us?" Kelly asked.

"He and Jorge made the choice to rebel and go AWOL. We have our orders. Let's go find them." Fred said with rather strong determination.

* * *

><p>May 8th, 2563<p>

[Another Classified ONI Installation]

Admiral Osman sighed as she followed the two, black-clad SPARTAN-IV bodyguards down the facility's hallway. _I have the entire Infinity-battlegroup after Keyes, not to mention the entire fleet has been notified. He can't hide forever. But something tells me, something in my gut, that he has a few tricks up his sleeve._

The admiral's thoughts were interrupted when the doors of a large lab opened up.

"Dr. Erik Steinman."

"Admiral Osman. I understand you wanted to know about my secret project." Erik responded.

"yes. Did you get it working?"

"you mean his device? Yes he did. It only worked for a short amount of time, and it did self-destruct in the end, but that time was all that I needed." Came another voice from the corner of the room. Out stepped a women in teal-blue armor with bright-red hair in a ponytail and green eyes. She had two Desert Eagles clipped to her waists and an MA5D rifle on her back, as well as her old grappling gun on a holster.

"Agent Carolina. I take it you got your old team back?" Osman asked, her arms folded across her chest.

"yes, I did. Now I understand the mission parameters, what you want us to do. But why add Locus and Felix? My team and I, we can do this mission on our own. They're nothing but trouble, loose ends if nothing else." Carolina said a little harshly.

"I trust you've taken a look at the Task Force 141 roster. You're gonna need all the help you can get to bring them in. And I can't send in any of the SPARTAN-IV's, I need them at the front to hold off Jul 'Mdama's forces and suppress the Insurrectionist movement."

"fine. But I want to use any methods necessary to bring them in. Armor enhancements, new weapons, whatever we ask for, we get it. Or you won't have our services."

"alright then. You'll get whatever you ask for. All I am asking is that you track down the 141 and bring them back, nothing more."

"we do this, you'll uphold your end of the bargain?" the former Freelancer asked.

"don't I always?" Osman replied with an almost heart-warming smile.

* * *

><p>May 8th, 2563<p>

[Classified ONI Installation]

Hanger Bay 7B

A jet-back Prowler rested in the middle of the hanger deck, albeit heavily augmented with a more perfected FTL engine and more advanced cloaking systems. Agents Carolina, York, North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming, Maine, and C.T. all stood in front of the large craft, with the two mercenaries they only knew as Locus and Felix with them.

"everyone knows the mission?" Carolina asked.

"yes ma'am. Track down the 141 and bring them back at all costs." Locus replied.

"that's right. We have direct authorization from Adm. Osman to use lethal force at any time, so don't hesitate. Understand?"

"yes ma'am!" everyone barked. As everyone loaded onto the craft, they all really had one thing in mind: that if they pulled off this mission, Adm. Osman had _better_ kept up her end of the deal. As the prowler took off, deep into the recesses of the various science labs, Erik quickly pulled up the schematics to I-17 Array.

"I really hope you receive this." He muttered as he quickly typed up the message. Pressing the send button, he sighed. "I hope you can forgive me. I've done all I could, Doc. It's up to you now." He muttered. Slowly opening the desk drawer, he pulled out a bottle of whiskey and a loaded .357 Magnum revolver. Popping the top off the bottle, he took a long drink before he cocked the gun, pressed the barrel to his right temple and squeezed the trigger.

* * *

><p><strong>As I said at the top, this is my last chapter for this story. I should start posting up the sequel in about a week or so. Thanks to everyone who's enjoyed this story.<strong>


End file.
